Thirty days of tree planting, Bingo and Dr. Seuss
It rained on the first day of Brad Jamison’s volunteer challenge: “Thirty Days of Service, Improving the world, and myself… one day at a time.”
He was to drive to the Angeles Forest for a Tree People project that was now cancelled.
Undaunted, the McCadden Place resident soon found another volunteer job to kick start his ambitious effort to volunteer at a different organization every day for a month.
Within hours he was reading “The Cat in a Hat” to a class of autistic children thanks to volunteerlosangeles.org and his home computer.
It just so happened he had recently brought back what is his favorite book from his mom’s home in New Jersey.
“It’s tricky. It’s a tongue twister,” he said of the reading. But aside from tackling the language of Dr. Seuss, volunteering is a relatively easy thing to do.
Even fun, adds Brad.
A board member of the Hollywood Boys’ & Girls’ Club, he “got a whole different perspective” spending a day doing something very un-board like—he helped children at the site with their homework.
He would have been happy to do child-oriented good deeds the length of his self-induced challenge from April 1 to 30.
But he wanted to document the myriad of opportunities out there in his effort to give back to L.A.
He volunteered in Skid Row and South Central, Inglewood,
Van Nuys and Venice. He carried boxes and did other heavy lifting to aid a center—that helps low-income families—move to a new location.
He played bingo with Big Brothers, and through Covenant House he met homeless teens in Hollywood—to his surprise, they are a mile and a half from his house “on a street I drive all the time… “It was eye-opening. You start to see your city in a different way.”
In Westwood, he met veterans; he fed the hungry, worked with rescue dogs and delivered meals to homebound seniors.
He sifted among 30,000 choices at volunteerlosangeles.org and laworks.com and got tips from friends and family.
“I find the most rewarding service is when I get to interact with the recipient,” he says.
A former Disney/ABC TV “pro-social marketer,” volunteerism stems from Brad’s early mission work with his church and family.
Service, he says, can come through many forms—helping a neighbor shop for groceries or to walk their dog, when they are unable to, for instance.
He eventually hooked up with Tree People on day 15 in Pan Pacific Park, where he joined others digging the tar-laden dirt with pick axes.
By the end of his month-long odyssey, he was exhausted but uplifted. He is chronicling his experience at ThirtyDaysofService.com.
“I really want to inspire people to get out and give back.”
Category: People