Jennifer, a single mother and waitress from Asheville, North Carolina, registered to get help from Pandemic of Love back in July when she was diagnosed with COVID-19 and sent home for several weeks. “I rely on tips to get by and although it was still slower than usual due to the pandemic, I was managing to squeak by — then I got sick and everything started to collapse. I didn’t know how I was going to feed my kids.” Suzi Israel, the Asheville Pandemic of Love chapter leader stepped in and helped match her with a donor for groceries, her utility bills and past due rent.
After she recuperated and tested negative for the virus, Jennifer returned to work and has since become Pandemic of Love’s best ambassador. Last week, while waiting on a local couple, she told them all about her experience with the organization and, upon learning about the organization, they asked if she could connect them to Suzi.
The couple, so touched by Jennifer’s passion and story, later called Suzi and arranged to meet her the following day, providing her with $1500 worth of supermarket gift cards for distribution to other local families with food insecurity so that they could have enough food for the holidays. The chain of kindness never ends — it just keeps getting paid forward.
Read more about the work Pandemic of Love is doing on https://www.pandemicoflove.com/