EDITORIAL: Selfless acts define holiday season

Published 12:00 pm Friday, December 23, 2022

The south wind skittering snowflakes across Mount Hope Cemetery struck exposed cheeks like the slap of a cold palm.

But the bitter conditions didn’t deter the volunteers who gathered the morning of Dec. 17 to honor veterans buried there.

After Betty Milliman, regent for the Lone Pine Tree chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, made brief remarks, the group set about its chilly task — placing wreaths on veterans’ graves.

This is the first year Baker City has participated in Wreaths Across America, an annual event that started in 1992. Charles Risley III, a Korean War veteran from Baker City, bought 400 wreaths for the veterans section at Mount Hope. Other donors sponsored 113 more wreaths, so there were enough to decorate veterans’ gravesites elsewhere in the cemetery.

Honoring the men and women who have done so much to protect freedom in America was just one of many local examples of Baker’s generosity during the holiday season.

At Lew Brothers Tires, a chest brimmed with toys that will be given to children who are represented by CASA volunteers or who are in foster care.

CASA stands for Court-Appointed Special Advocates. These are volunteers who help represent children who are in the court system.

Baker City Cub Scouts Pack 432 made a major contribution with donated toys they received from Walmart.

Students from Brooklyn Primary and South Baker Intermediate schools engaged in a friendly competition, bringing change to school over the past month to donate to CASA. The students combined to donate $2,189.30 — Brooklyn brought in $1,278.19, and South Baker raised $911.11.

All year long, volunteers with Best Friends of Baker and New Hope for Eastern Oregon Animals strive to rescue cats and dogs and find loving homes for them.

Students from Haines Elementary made popcorn balls and donated them to the senior center in Baker City.

There are so many other examples.

Many will never be known except to those who benefit from their generosity, because the most selfless people often are also the most humble. Many prefer, or even insist on, anonymity.

We don’t all have the ability to help in the most tangible ways, by buying wreaths or rescuing pets or buying gifts.

But every person can enrich others’ lives.

Shovel snow from a neighbor’s sidewalk.

Pick up groceries for someone who’s not feeling well.

Even a smile, wave and a few minutes of conversation can transform someone’s day from sad, or just mundane, to something more, something better.

And for you as well as for them.