Seven years ago, I was an Executive Director and CEO. Today, I am but a mere Secretary, but to tell the truth I enjoy keeping 50 of my fellow Kiwanis members organized and well fed.
This is my third year as Secretary to our 51 member Kiwanis Club on Longboat Key in Florida. The Secretary must be an early riser, to arrive at the club before 7:00 AM, and often two or three older gentlemen are already there drinking coffee. I am the keeper of the books, and the board minutes, and leader of the morning song, and every quarter the person who extols our membership to pay their dues on time. Having started out my life as a "skip tracer" and collector of student loans, this task comes easy. I am also responsible for preparing the weekly agenda for our Club President (a retired Judge from Pittsburgh), and also manage the deposit of "happy dollars" to our Foundation account. Happy Dollars for our club are the weekly collection of $1 from each member present, which goes into our scholarship foundation. They get the name because a member can comment about what he or she is happy about that week (grandchildren, anniversary, etc.). Last year, our Foundation awarded $18,000 in college scholarships to a dozen students attending schools in Sarasota or Manatee County. Members celebrating a birthday or wedding anniversary are asked to commemorate those events with an appropriate tax-deductible check to the Foundation. This year I personally deposited $62 and $39 - all to a good cause.
This coming Saturday, we'll have our annual Pancake Breakfast, where no fewer than 40 of our 50 members will show up to cook flapjacks and grill sausage (or clear tables) for the community. The event runs from 7 AM to 11 AM, and costs $5 per person. We just completed our Citizen of the Year event, with over 100 attending to celebrate the accomplishments of a local citizen, plus awarding plaques to our Policeman and Firefighter of the Year. We also recognized a past Kiwanis President as Kiwanian of the Year. I was pleased to see him gain this honor, as he had welcomed me into the club in 2004 and has been an unofficial mentor for me. In 2006 I was asked to take over the Secretary's duties, and like the damn fool and workaholic that I am, I said yes.
I'm proud to say we've made a number of refinements of process, and at age 62 I represent a "youth movement" in our club. This past year we added a few members, born in the 1950's, replacing two who left us, who both were born in the 1920's. On this island, baby boomers are in the ascendancy, as we move from the cold North and Midwest and settle in Florida. We used to say "trust nobody over 30" - today we say "trust nobody under 60". It's all relative.
Kiwanis is an international organization based in Indianapolis, and has a motto "serving the children of the world". While our island has very few children, we hold our largest fund raising project every November on behalf of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. For the past five years, we've raised and forwarded over $30,000 each year for St. Jude, while simultaneously raising $15,000 for our scholarship fund.
So, Kiwanis has a busy schedule on this seasonal island, with St. Jude, Salvation Army Bell Ringing (our Publix super market bucket is always the top or second highest yielding collection points in Sarasota County), following up with our Citizen of the Year (February) and Pancake Breakfast (March). And, for the second year in a row, we're collecting food stuffs from departing snow-birds to benefit the All Faith Food Bank. Last year we collected a ton of food from 2 dozen condominium associations, and hope to exceed that figure this year with a two month project ending after Easter.
So, if you're looking for me on any Thursday morning, you won't find me asleep in bed - I'll be at the welcome desk or behind the microphone doing announcements at Kiwanis - just one of the many new adventures that retirement has brought me.
No comments:
Post a Comment