A unique perspective on love
I’m a secret romantic. While I may publicly cringe at the Hallmark-driven buzz in February, it brings joy to my heart to see people in love. To put it simply, I love love. Valentine’s Day was never a huge deal in my life until I had a daughter. Now, we celebrate “Valentime’s” Day for an entire week, sometimes more. I have a smile on my face as she discovers all the different ways love shows up in our world.
In the spirit of the holiday, I want to share some examples of love I get to see in the work we do at The Findlay-Hancock County Community Foundation.
I see the love our donors have when they establish funds or give to existing funds that matter to them: Dale Dorney, our founding donor, whose gift formed the nucleus of the Foundation; Madeleine Schneider, who cared so deeply about our community that she gave the largest unrestricted gift to TCF to date to ensure needs could be addressed now and in the future; two donors who loved their adopted pets so much that they named funds after them; a donor who started a fund for a nonprofit his wife served with for many years as a surprise present; and a donor who started a fund to help make it easier for others to grow their families through adoption to honor their journey to becoming a family.
Every day we work with donors who give a gift, set up a fund, or include us in an estate plan to demonstrate their love for a cause or their community.
Of course I see love in the impact side of our work, too. When people come together in places like Arcadia, Arlington, McComb and Mt. Blanchard by participating in Community Heart & Soul, I see the love. Every day, we see nonprofit organizations, their staff and volunteers, who love their work enough to do whatever they can to serve our friends, families and neighbors in Hancock County.
Finally, I see those who love their community enough to give their time to programs like the Foundation’s Community Conversations. We heard from participants that the most pressing issues in Hancock County are housing, mental health/harmful substance use, transportation and affordable community activities, along with several others in tier 2 and 3. While these are big mountains to climb, we are willing to do the hard work because of love. We love our community and the people in it enough to roll up our sleeves, come together and work hard on the promise that tomorrow can be better than today.
There are so many ways we can work together to continue to share the love. Visit our website at community-foundation.com, give us a call or stop by to tell us what you love about your community, and how we can help you turn that passion into a legacy.
This editorial was originally printed in The Courier Saturday, February 25, 2023.
