Just do it #4: Do a random act of kindness/ charity

Isn't this an altruistic challenge? Cue Michael Jackson's "Heal the World"!

I started brainstorming for this challenge by being practical. I didn't have much time until teacher week, which I knew would go by in a stressful blur of decorating, copying, and trying to look alert by the millionth meeting. That meant no to adopting babies, Brangelina style. I would have to nix trying to save the whales. And I definitely wasn't going to be opening the Christen Zoolander Center for Kids Who Can't Read Good (and who want to do other stuff good too.)

What was this "do gooder" to do?

I decided I would start with something simple. The local school was asking for school supplies to help their large population of homeless students. I felt like this would be a very fitting act of charity, given that I'm a teacher and know how expensive those school supplies are. I can't imagine anything harder for an elementary student than being homeless: to sleep in different shelters, feel jealous of other students' new outfits and backpacks, hide embarrassment about their circumstances. And how heart-breaking must it be for a parent to send his or her student off to school unprepared?

Granted what I'm about to say reveals my nerdy side, but I remember feeling kind of excited on our annual Staples jaunt to buy school supplies, especially during elementary school. Something about my bright pink and purple Lisa Frank Trapper Keeper made the start to the new school year a bit more exciting!
(Any girls out there who went to school in the early 90's, ya'll knows what I'm talking about! Guarantee some of you had these folders, too!)

It makes me sad to think that there are many kids who miss out on all the exciting preparations to return to school, but it's easy to understand why when you start to add up the cost.

When I was perusing the school's website, I was initially shocked at the long list that each student's family was expected to buy. For instance, each kindergartner was expected to buy a bookbag, two composition books, four bottles of glue, ten (?!) glue sticks, 3 boxes of tissues, box of large Ziplocs, one three ring binder, box of small Ziplocs, wipes, three boxes of crayons, two three-tab folders, pink eraser, loose leaf, and a box of pencils. Dan and I reasoned that the school asks for more supplies than one student would ever use to compensate for the huge amounts of students who do not bring supplies. I can certainly see why lower-income families would struggle to spend $60 and up per child.

Anyhoo, one hellish trip to Walmart finagling our cart through the back-to-school crowd and a much lighter wallet later, we succeeded in outfitting one first grader for the first day of school. I hope that whoever gets these supplies will think the blinking G.I. Joe backpack is as super-cool as Dan and I hoped it would be.

Verdict: Even though it was a small act of charity, I consider Just do it #4 a success! I am disappointed that I chickened out of giving blood as my act of charity, which was my initial plan, but that will be a great challenge for later...

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For my next "Just do it Challenge", I'm going to learn to speak basic Italian. Very basic. I'm talking about two dozen or so survival phrases, like "Where's the bathroom?" and "Back off, thief!" Why the sudden interest, you may ask? Because Dan and I finally booked a nine day trip to Italy over spring break! I think Dan finally pitied me for reading all those Fodor's travel books, and we both decided to stop talking about it and just do it! (Very fitting for this challenge, don't you think?)

By my next update, I may not know all the phrases, but I plan on at least making flashcards so that I can gradually learn them over the next few months. Dan and I also have some fun theme oriented ideas about starting to plan the trip, so stay tuned for some of the details coming soon. If you've already been to Italy and have recommendations, definitely leave a comment because I would love to know about the best cities, hostels, restaurants, gelato stands, safety tips, etc. Also, if you know how the hell to pronounce "chiamo" (name), that would be helpful too!

'Til then, arrivederci!