Community Lunch - Connection throughout Isolation
Westdene Barn has been a hub of community enterprise since locals wrestled it back into public use. With help to start up last year from Sussex Community Foundation, we run a once a month ‘Get Together to Eat Together’ lunch. What I love most about our community lunch is that it’s really about companionship. Our word company comes from the Latin ‘con-panis’ (with bread) expressing the deep significance of sharing a meal together. Whilst the focus has been on social isolation, in an area with large numbers of elderly folk, the lunch club is open to everyone and for the benefit of all.
For me, it’s an escape from the rat race and an opportunity to engage in timeless conversations with people of all ages and backgrounds. I now know that my missing garden bulbs will be found in a squirrel’s larder stash! February’s lunch was particularly special with January’s cancellation encouraging new volunteers through our doors, eager to keep the lunch going. One of whom, Emily O’Sullivan (6) came with her mum Danielle and brought a huge apple crumble to share. Her shy smile grew into a beaming hostess, brightly zipping around, reminding us that spring was around the corner.
Spring might be round the corner, but so of course has been the Corona virus impact. The first question was how to support our guests, few of whom were willing to let the lunch stop. Our will to join in, to be useful, in truth, our need for love, comes home to us in the current crisis. During enforced isolation with the fear of loss, not just of health but also possibly livelihoods and access to resources, Nature guides us towards our cooperative, caring community spirit. This will sustain not only those vulnerable today, but also those who may become so as time goes on.
In the coming months, a renewed understanding of our mutual need for one another will be the potential silver lining to emerge from the crisis. Many of us will be all too aware of the isolation issues so many of our community already suffer. That is why the lunch club was so important, not only for guests, but for volunteers alike. We all described a ‘warm buzz’ and a certain priceless smile from being a part of this jolly lunch club. In my work as a therapist, I have for some time joined in the growing concern over the covert isolation that our smart phones and online technology create. Now as we seek to find new ways of keeping connected and being part of our local community, technology, coupled with our ingenious community spirit, are united in the need for genuine communication.
Charlotte Hastings, Therapy Kitchen
For me, it’s an escape from the rat race and an opportunity to engage in timeless conversations with people of all ages and backgrounds. I now know that my missing garden bulbs will be found in a squirrel’s larder stash! February’s lunch was particularly special with January’s cancellation encouraging new volunteers through our doors, eager to keep the lunch going. One of whom, Emily O’Sullivan (6) came with her mum Danielle and brought a huge apple crumble to share. Her shy smile grew into a beaming hostess, brightly zipping around, reminding us that spring was around the corner.
Spring might be round the corner, but so of course has been the Corona virus impact. The first question was how to support our guests, few of whom were willing to let the lunch stop. Our will to join in, to be useful, in truth, our need for love, comes home to us in the current crisis. During enforced isolation with the fear of loss, not just of health but also possibly livelihoods and access to resources, Nature guides us towards our cooperative, caring community spirit. This will sustain not only those vulnerable today, but also those who may become so as time goes on.
In the coming months, a renewed understanding of our mutual need for one another will be the potential silver lining to emerge from the crisis. Many of us will be all too aware of the isolation issues so many of our community already suffer. That is why the lunch club was so important, not only for guests, but for volunteers alike. We all described a ‘warm buzz’ and a certain priceless smile from being a part of this jolly lunch club. In my work as a therapist, I have for some time joined in the growing concern over the covert isolation that our smart phones and online technology create. Now as we seek to find new ways of keeping connected and being part of our local community, technology, coupled with our ingenious community spirit, are united in the need for genuine communication.
Charlotte Hastings, Therapy Kitchen