Winter time for lots of people means sweaters, adding extra blankets to your bed, and cranking up the heat in your home. But for others, it means sleeping on the streets and trying to avoid things like hypothermia or freezing to death.
When you’re homeless, items like a good pair of shoes, dry socks, and a warm jacket are crucial for your survival.
And the demand for those items is high. This year New York Cares hosted its annual coat drive, which is the largest drive in NYC, and had a request for 103,000 coats but only collected 75,000. New York Cares’ Executive Director Gary Bagley says that it’s not only the homeless that need coat donations it’s also low-income families.
Bagley told Vice that it “keeps getting harder to get to that 75,000 coats,” and “requests just keep going up.”
That’s exactly why an elderly Pennsylvania man puts up a giving Christmas tree in his yard each year.
He doesn’t decorate the tree with bright lights or ornaments but there are presents under it… well, more like on it.
He hangs bagged items like new shoes, warm clothes, personal hygiene items and other things people in poverty may need and people can then take what they need from the tree.
One of the man’s neighbors, who goes by SilentxSage on Reddit, posted a photo of the tree to the HumansBeingBros page of the social media site.
“Every year, this kind old man in my hometown offers clothing, shoes and anything useful to anyone in need,” SilentxSage wrote on Reddit.
Apparently, there is a huge demand for the items on the tree.
“From what I’ve seen of it, he runs out of children’s shoes and clothes every day,” SilentxSage said.
That post ended up going viral and inspired lots of people who read it.
“This could actually re-define the contemporary Christmas tree. I love it,” one Redditor said.
“You could set up a tree in a public place, where people could bring their own donations and hang them, while others could freely take what they needed,” another said.
“Maybe it could be done year-round instead of just on Christmas too!” said another.
People also shared stories about similar ideas they’ve seen in their own hometowns.
“Every year there’s a Swap Market in my town. You bring stuff you don’t need anymore, and take things that other people don’t need anymore. It seems to work really well,” one commenter said.
Hopefully, this post will inspire people to do kind things like this in their own hometown.
Please SHARE this with your friends and family.
