You Might Want To Volunteer

And Get Kids Involved, Too

I associate 100 Grand Bars with my childhood. They bring back a specific memory of sitting on the bus next to my to-this-day best friend, eating a fun-size candy bar on the way back to school from volunteering at the food bank. A man from the warehouse would reward each of us with a 100 Grand Bar for—moving boxes around? Helping more than getting in the way? The mixture of dense caramel and crispy bits was so satisfying after a morning of work.

I feel grateful that I grew up surrounded by adults who found ways to get kids involved in the community. My fifth-grade teacher organized the trips to the food bank and arranged for us to make art for local nursing homes. My youth group took trips to volunteer with Habitat for Humanity. After his mother died, my father volunteered to visit people in hospice care. He asked me to make a mobile for a man who liked to fish. It did not come out well, and that still bothers me more than it should.

If you’re reading this, there is a decent chance that you volunteer for something. Volunteerism is a special part of American culture, and 77.34 million adults volunteered in 2023.

So, if we are singing from the same hymnal, please tell me about your experiences in the comments. And Happy National Volunteer Month! In the meantime, I have some thoughts on volunteering, building community, and bringing the kids along. This eventually involves alpacas, so bear with me.

Oh, it was hard to choose photos for this post! I try not to include other people without their permission, but I got a smile from browsing through pictures of people I volunteer with or my daughter snuggling with so many animals and posing for snapshots out in the community.

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Some quick housekeeping! I had two pieces come out last week elsewhere on the internet. Clearly, I was channeling my inner Andie Anderson with these headlines:

At The Brevity Blog, I published “How a Box in the Woods Taught Me to Write About Nature,” a short essay about covering nature and climate change from a non-expert perspective, including activities.

At HerStry, I had “How to Climb a Fourteener When You’re Afraid of Heights,” an older bit of writing that has made me crave going out into the mountains again.

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Finding Community

I have moved states a few times, and each caused disorienting loneliness. I don’t know who anyone is. I don’t know where I am. I have no community. In grad school, I did not know anyone outside of my program. I tried volunteering at a soup kitchen in the city, but there was a man who said things that made me uncomfortable a couple of times, and I quit. I look back now, much older and having worked in a jail for four years, and I think, “Oh, sweet summer Kasey, you should have told him to bug off.” I felt so isolated for a long time.

So when we moved to Colorado, intending to stay, I decided to find community. One of the benefits of volunteering is that you can check out different groups of people. They will not all be a good fit, and that’s okay. Over the years, I have met so many people and learned so much. I am not close with many of the people I volunteer with, but by virtue of knowing them and knowing all the good work going on where I live, I feel less alone. I have a network of kind people with different experiences and passions.

Seeing members of your community working to make it safer, more beautiful, healthier, and better informed also fosters a feeling of belonging and security. If you feel like we’re doomed, I suggest volunteering instead of scrolling. Really.

There are tons of ways to get involved, many of which take no more than a few hours a month.¹ Please don’t think I’m telling you to do all of them. In this stage of my life, I am fortunate to have flexibility in my schedule. I am really busy, but to a large degree, I control my time. So the amount that I volunteer has grown, and Julio usually asks me what I will drop before I pick up something new. I always say that I will spend less time on the internet. I’m kind of fibbing when I tell him that, but I can always spend less time reading about some drama in favor of making myself useful.

I think one of the most valuable parts of volunteering for our specific moment is that it gets us out of our digital silos. I know I don’t agree about everything with everyone I volunteer alongside, but in all my years, I have yet to encounter a purity test or any “whataboutism” at volunteer meetings. The sorts of rhetoric and perfectionism that divide people online are much harder to find in the real world, where you are just trying to get something done, and do it well. And when you disagree, talking about things face to face is more productive.

Learn the Community

Before Julio and I even had an apartment in Denver, I signed up to volunteer as a docent at the Molly Brown House Museum. Margaret Brown was a childhood hero of mine, and while moving to the city where she lived, volunteering at the house seemed like a slam dunk. It has now been almost nine years since I completed initial training. I value the people whom I have gotten to talk with about the house, history, and Colorado over all these years. As I wrote around Halloween, one of my favorite fellow volunteers and I usually swap ghost stories when we bump into each other.

To put Margaret’s story in context, I have picked up details about Denver, suffrage history, labor movements, and mining that I did not learn in school because I did not grow up here. Sometimes guests ask me how I know so much (very flattering), and I will mention that I have a Ph.D. in American literature, but also that I have been doing tours for a long time and learned from other volunteers, guests’ knowledge and questions, and ongoing training.

Right before my first shift at the Molly Brown House nine years ago, and in Margaret's room earlier this year

Similarly, when Julio and I decided we were serious about alpacas, we volunteered to help with shearing day at a big alpaca ranch. We were a little intimidated at first, but the ranchers at Stargazer are big in the alpaca community here, and they were generous with their knowledge. We connected with the alpaca community and handling the animals on their most stressful day of the year taught us some things that no book ever could.

For one thing, it taught me that animals do not respect me. So, between that realization and my concern for animal welfare, I volunteered at Luvin’ Arms, a sanctuary for farmed animals. At Luvin’ Arms, I got more comfortable around herd animals (I love sheep), large livestock, and birds, and I learned how to clean a barn. They keep their facilities immaculate and emphasize animal care and biosecurity. I did not get to volunteer long at Luvin’ Arms before the pandemic started and I was very pregnant, but I am excited that my daughter is big enough now for us to go back to shuck together.

In fact, right before a volunteer shift at Luvin’ Arms, I found out I was pregnant. Tony the Llama is the first one I told, even before Julio. Tony was rescued from neglect and eventual abandonment, so he liked his space, but he was majestic.

One of our local CSAs also accepts volunteers to work at the farm, and the labor covers part of a share of vegetables that season. What an opportunity to learn about gardening or to get experience if you don’t have outdoor space for planting!

RIP Tony Llama. Me with as much of Tito the cow I could fit in a selfie.

See a Need, Meet a Need

Earlier this year, we had a cold, difficult morning helping clean the cow and pig pastures at Luvin’ Arms. My daughter just wanted to play with the goats on their playground and was upset while I tried to shovel cow paddies that were frozen to the ground.

In the car, I tried to talk with her about how playing with the goats is the reward for doing good work, and we were there to care for the animals. Eventually, she dozed off and I thought about what I wanted her to get out of the experience. I wanted her to know that there are many ways to make the world a little better, and one of them is to come back and shovel pig poops again and again. It’s not glamorous, and the pigs might not thank you for it, but it matters nonetheless.

So often, service boils down to “see a need, meet a need.” I can’t do everything, but I can do something. Over and over.

There are also opportunities to volunteer once or sporadically around certain needs. Julio has volunteered to help restore hiking trails, and we have helped One Tree Planted do reforestation work after a local wildfire.

Stronger Together

The value of volunteering often comes from how those little actions add up. Maybe because of social media and feel-good stories of one individual making a huge difference, the impact of many people doing little actions gets overshadowed. But, the little actions do make a difference. Those pigs like a clean stall. Every time a volunteer covers a docent shift at the museum, that is free labor that the museum does not have to cover with a limited budget. And, logging those volunteer hours can help institutions applying for grants. With funding and grants for science, the humanities, libraries, and public health getting slashed, we need each other in the community even more. Showing up makes a statement about the importance of an issue to the community. Singing with the chorus does not lead to personal glory, but it creates a richer, louder sound.

My girl loves to pull a wagon full of manure, but not as much as she loves playing with goats.

Volunteering with Your Kids

There is a weirdly anti-child streak in our culture, and honestly, it can leave out parents who want to get involved. I think a lot of community groups welcome children, but I wish they were more upfront about it. Parenting has become hyper-intensive, often centering children in the family life in ways that can be isolating. Gentle parenting can teeter into permissive parenting, and—as a person who has a small child—I have also had difficult interactions with other people’s kids in public spaces. I mean, my daughter got bit on the face at the library once. And adults, you can be loud and annoying, too. If you are going to criticize parents about “iPad kids,” you have to accept that active kids are sometimes messy, noisy, and weird. As are adults, who were all once children.

I will say this without qualification: my child has a right to be out in the world. And I cannot teach her how to be a good community member if she never gets to practice.

There are plenty of children's spaces in which she can practice sharing, playing, etc. but I also think it is important to challenge her and to insert her into the broader community in ways that are safe but maybe a little difficult. I’d never take her with me if I thought she would be unsafe or disruptive, but if there is a family-friendly volunteer opportunity, I’ll take it. And if she is not explicitly welcomed, but I think she would do okay, I ask. That’s how she ended up tabling with my Citizens’ Climate Lobby chapter.

Moms groups are a great way to get kids involved. If you’ve struggled to find mom friends like I have, it’s also an opportunity to meet like-minded parents and, for example, to find out about the public schools, etc. Moms Demand Action often has family-friendly events. I took my daughter to my state Capitol for an event with Mountain Mamas, a group that advocates for clean air, water, and public lands. That was an especially rewarding visit because I wanted my daughter to see her government at work and to give her a baseline memory that she belongs there, too. She proudly told legislators and their aides that she “speaks for the trees” while she helped deliver letters and artwork from older kids. Then, the governor’s secretary gave the kids candy, and it was downhill from there. But, each time I have gone to the Capitol without her since, my daughter has been so jealous.

At the Capitol to talk to legislators about clean air and energy. I took my daughter once and she was so jealous that I went back without her--and met this amazing therapy dog! I usually wear the same, ten year-old dress when doing environmental lobbying. A little way to walk the walk.

Volunteering with a small child is not easy, though. Anytime I take her out into the grown-up world, I have to assume that at least 40% of my mental energy will be devoted to keeping an eye on her and answering questions. I do prep work to set my bright, energetic kid (and introverted me) up for success as best I can.

Then, there’s how other adults factor in. Along with the hyper-intensive parenting, I have also observed this streak that other adults don’t want people to tell their kid anything. I cannot tell you how many children I have helped at the library while their parents are MIA. That’s pretty straightforward, but what if the kid is doing something they shouldn’t be or picking on mine?

The hardest volunteer activity I take my daughter to is Family Volunteer Day at Luvin’ Arms. She’s a well-behaved kid, and it’s an activity designed to include people of all ages, but there are also animals involved, and it can be physically demanding or cold, and her obsession with the goats has led to some challenges for her patience. The volunteer coordinators are welcoming and warm to my daughter, but they have also physically moved her away from a pig, asked her to say please, and given other small reminders. Occasionally, it has been hard on my ego. Mostly, however, I have reminded myself of an article I read at Slate, “I’m Starting to Think You Guys Don’t Really Want a ‘Village’.” I hate it when someone has to correct my kid’s behavior. It embarrasses me. But I won’t let my hurt feelings rob her of the opportunity to learn, and I am grateful that these other adults take the time and care to get down on my kid’s level and teach her. And didn’t let a cow step on her.

Volunteering with my daughter means I cannot always show up as my best, most focused self. But that vulnerability means that I am entering the community more authentically and, I hope, teaching my child that she belongs and can contribute in all sorts of places.

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April is National Volunteer Month, and National Volunteer Appreciation Week is April 21-26th this year. One of the fringe benefits of volunteering in my community is that many museums offer reciprocal perks to celebrate. I usually take my daughter to some museums that week because I get free admission.

If you want to find a way to volunteer, there might be great information available locally that week. You could also check Mobilize, community newspapers, or the websites of libraries, museums, parks, or other places you love. Love is the best place to start.

1. I focused in this post on volunteering in person, but I have participated in plenty of volunteerism that takes place remotely, which can help with both accessibility and childcare concerns.