Truck Crew Memories

by Rick Clute and Sarah Clute

For those of you that joined in to pass out Passover food boxes for Maot Chitim this year, thank you for participating.  As a result of your actions and the actions of others, hundreds of families were able to have a wonderful traditional Passover meal with their seders!

For the last five or six years my daughter Sarah and I have been part of the truck crew for the delivery.  We thought you might want a behind the scenes account of what it is like to be involved in this mitzvah from this vantage point.

This year the warehouse was located in Evanston.  Eric Berman, our Social Action Committee chair and organizer of the event, called for our truck crew to be at the Evanston location at 7:15 AM.  Meanwhile, Eric and Art Noparstak (the designated truck driver) picked up the truck at 6:15AM and met us at the warehouse.  The truck crew then waits its turn in the queue until it is time to load the truck.

For this delivery, the crew consisted of Steve Lasaine, Steve Leventhal, Art Noparstak, Rick Clute, Sarah Clute, and Eric Berman.  When it is our turn, the truck is backed into the loading dock and we start loading the truck with the help of numerous warehouse volunteers. There is a person at the warehouse in charge of keeping count of the boxes and everyone counts boxes as we load the truck.  The warehouse every year is a bustle of activity that looks like total mayhem, but behind all the confusion there is a well oiled machine that continues to work from year to year. 

Once the truck is stacked and packed with boxes the truck crew starts its journey to the location that you are all familiar with, our adopted building in Niles. It is here we are enthusiastically greeted by Robin Soderstrom (the Or Shalom congregant designated to manage the building), Sarra Polotilo (the resident building captain) and the Or Shalom volunteer families waiting to unload the truck and pass out the boxes. 

Once we leave the Or Shalom building in Niles, we continue to two other locations to deliver boxes for delivery.  Our truck crew was responsible for delivering close to 200 boxes when all was said and done, feeding over 200 recipients.  Now that's a mitzvah!

 Each year at Christmas, Or Shalom takes over a local PADS shelter
which allows staff to spend the holiday with their families.  Our
adult and child volunteers always have a lot of fun helping out at the shelter.
Hope you can join us next year!