One of the benefits I get from my Kiwanis Club membership is the opportunity it provides to understand better humanity. The service my club provides allows me to see people as they are and not as they are stereotyped by convention or public opinion. When I ring bells for the Salvation Army outside a local Wal-Mart store in the cold, or downtown in the heart of the city, I find that you cannot predict who will contribute to the collection bucket (for those of you in other countries, we do this to raise money to help those in need). In fact, more often than not, it is the obviously well to do who won’t even respond to a happy holidays greeting while a child dressed in old clothes will drop in more than they can afford.

My most recent experience resulted in my becoming more optimistic about the future than I was last week. You see, I joined my fellow Kiwanis members at a local store early Saturday morning for our annual clothe-a-child event. I always have some trepidation when I do this, wondering if I will be working with a family that includes unruly children.

Each member of our club is assigned a family who has been selected by a local community organization due to their need to provide their children some winter clothing. When my assigned family arrived, I found that no parent was joining us as their mother, who was raising them on her own, was working two jobs to make ends meet. There were three boys, a 9-year-old, a 13-year-old and an 18-year-old, who is a senior in high school.

I prepared myself for a morning of frivolous purchase attempts with me reminding them that we had a limit of a few hundred dollars and it had to be used for practical clothes. Was I wrong, they didn’t need me at all! They decided they would buy for the 9-year-old first, the middle-schooler second and finish with the oldest. They chose warm practical jackets, socks, underwear, sweaters and the like.

These boys were gracious; obviously really cared for each other and you know what? They even cared about me. I wish I had met the mother who has done such a good job. They made sure that each got their fair share of the money we had to spend. They asked for each other’s advice and we had fun together. When we left the store, the two older boys shook my hand, wished me Merry Christmas and thanked me for the day. But best of all, the 9-year-old gave me a big hug and told me he hoped Santa gave me something really good.

These were public school city kids from a family with little money who too often the world thinks of as being the source of so many of our problems. In reality, they were three of the most caring and together kids I have ever met. Yes, I am more optimistic about the future, because with children like these to manage the years ahead, there is hope. I know I am much better off today than I would have been if I had never met them.