by Jiameng Sun ’20
When I first started to volunteer at the Saturday Sandwich Program in the First Baptist Church, my job was to make sandwiches. I knew it would be fun as I heard laughter from the kitchen. Muriel Curtis and Marilyn Ladd not only taught me how to make sandwiches fast and well, but also shared many amazing stories with me. Listening to their stories kept me coming back to make sandwiches week after week.
As Deacon of the First Baptist Church, Muriel was a member of the team that founded the Saturday Sandwich Program. Marilyn joined the program a few weeks later when she heard about it from her pastor at the Getchell Street Baptist Church. Both share the same goals: they want to help people living in Waterville, they want to live a meaningful life, and they want to inspire others. It is not easy for them to keep coming every week—Marilyn has to also care for her husband as he fights against illness—but they have done so for five years.
Muriel’s and Marilyn’s dedication pays back. More and more of the sandwich program’s customers have found jobs and can now support themselves. Muriel and Marilyn find that most customers just need a few weeks’ support before they get back on their feet. Muriel’s daughter met a woman at work who said that she once lost her job and didn’t have enough money to buy food, but she was able to get through the hard time with help from the sandwich program.
With the support of dedicated volunteers like Muriel and Marilyn, and with donations from the Cornerstone Christian Fellowship, the Getchell Street Baptist Church, and the First Baptist Church, the sandwich program provided 1,674 bagged meals containing 6,796 sandwiches last year. Though Muriel and Marilyn have already contributed a lot to the program, they want to do more. They would like to recruit more volunteers who can commit to a fixed schedule. They also would like to attract younger volunteers who can make the program more sustainable. They also hope to find a space to cook and serve hot meals for 40 people during winter months. While the First Baptist Church has an oven and some stoves, they don’t work anymore after being left unused for years.
One of the women told me, “We can’t do the right things all the time, but we should try to do the right things every time.” Muriel and Marilyn are doing what they say. I look forward to volunteering with them next semester and to hearing more fantastic stories from them, and I hope that others will join us in helping more people get back on their feet.