ASHEVILLE – I was terrified I was going to fail you this week: I didn't have time to volunteer. What with holiday deadlines, family visiting from Michigan, and the stress of cooking one's first turkey dinner, I had no idea where I was going to squeeze in my weekly commitment to service.

As I frantically combed through emails and interview notes from nonprofit providers looking for a quick and easy yet meaningful volunteer opportunity, I remembered something from one of the first meetings I took when I came to town — the United Way of Asheville and Buncombe County offers Portable Projects.

Thank God! I have still have my column (and my job).

"Our Portable Projects provide community service opportunities for families and individuals that fit their busy schedules," said my new savior, Charlie Lee, volunteer programs manager for Hands On Asheville-Buncombe, the volunteer program of the United Way.

Read more here. 

BLACK MOUNTAIN – Jim Parsons is overworked and underpaid but he couldn't be happier. As co-manager of the Kiwanis Thrift Shop in Black Mountain, Parsons, 84, volunteers at the store, which supports local children's charities, 15 to 20 hours a week.

When he's not running the cash register, he's trying out his jokes on the customers or harmlessly flirting with the women who organize the inventory in the back. "People say I should be a stand-up comedian, but I always tell them my problem is standing up," said Parsons, whose cheesy one-liner jokes kept me laughing throughout the afternoon as I finished up a long week of work volunteering at the Thrift Shop last Friday.

If you can't tell, Parsons is a bit of a ham. He's a great guy to volunteer with; he relentlessly tries to make you smile. "I've been here years and I still don't know the difference between slacks and capris," he said upon meeting me.

Read more here.

ASHEVILLE – The volunteers and staff at Meals on Wheels of Asheville and Buncombe County do so much more than the name implies. Yes, they drive around and deliver food to homebound seniors, but, more importantly, they become their clients' advocates and friends.

They bring them donations of used clothes and blankets, they give them Christmas presents, they help feed their pets, they provide excellent gossip and conversation and, at times, they have even been known to be matchmakers and lawnmowers.

I learned this on Tuesday after spending my morning driving around West Ashveille with volunteer Marsha Ott. Even though schools were delayed and snow covered the roads, we spent hours navigating windy neighborhood streets bringing people hot lunches. "You come away always feeling so good about people," Ott promised. "The clients, they will warm your heart."

​Read more here. 

​I love kids, especially the little ones. So, when the people at the Junior Achievement of Western Carolina asked me to help at a "JA in a Day" event at a local elementary school, I didn't hesitate to say yes.

When Interim Regional Director Meredith Switzer followed up a day later to tell me I would be teaching financial literacy to kindergarteners, I started to second-guess my decision.

It took me until I was at least 27 years old to understand that the secret to eliminating credit card debt was simply to not use them.

Read more here.

The day my first column came out, Laura Kirby, executive director of the Haywood Street Congregation, e-mailed me before I could even find a newspaper. It was 6:36 a.m. last Sunday when the message came through my inbox: "Please come to Haywood Street!" she wrote. "We'd love to have you Wednesday."

And so, three days later I found myself, tea still in hand, making an early morning walk down Patton Avenue to Kirby's church.
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The farther I got from the Citizen-Times, the more my surroundings changed. Instead of bustling tourists poking their heads in shops and restaurants, there were people sleeping on the streets. One man stopped me and said, "Woooo wheee! Ain't it great to see a woman heading to work this morning. We don't got no jobs."

Read more here. 

​As the new social issues reporter at the Citizen-Times, I think it's important to tell you that I'm bit of a volunteer junkie.

I spent the last three years of my life volunteering with the U.S. Peace Corps. For reasons I'm still unsure of, my husband and I chose to leave our jobs in Michigan near our friends and family and move to the middle of nowhere. At first we were sent to Kazakhstan. Placed in the remote Kyzyl Kum desert in the middle of the Kazakh steppe, at times it felt like it was just us and the camels.

Most recently, we were in Rwanda, in central/eastern Africa. We lived a in tiny village near the Ugandan border, where people farmed for less than a dollar a day and families' lives rotated around planting seasons and the rain.

​Read more here.