Garrett County’s first Empty Bowls event is a reminder that some of our neighbors are struggling with food insecurity.
A few days ago, I stopped by Deep Creek Pottery with a very simple assignment: pick a bowl.
The bowl I chose was to be painted, then fired in the kiln to become one of hundreds of handmade and hand-painted bowls gathered for Garrett County’s first Empty Bowls event, set for Sunday, September 20, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Wisp Resort.
The Empty Bowls began in the 1990s when a Michigan high school ceramics teacher and his students created bowls for a simple fundraising meal. Guests made a donation, ate soup and bread, and took their empty bowls home as a reminder that some community members were still hungry.
Here in Garrett County, it was Laurie Skidmore of Deep Creek Pottery who wanted to bring Empty Bowls to our community. She connected with Judy Carbone and Community Works Garrett, which in turn brought Garrett County Community Action Committee and its 360 Access Hub into the effort.
Deep Creek Pottery began inviting individuals and groups to their Deep Creek Pottery Studio to paint or make bowls. Laurie and Ron have been making bowls themselves and connecting with other local potters.
By the time we sat down to talk about the project, they had already collected more than 300 bowls.
When guests arrive at the Empty Bowls event, they’ll choose a bowl. They’ll have it filled with soup, share a meal and then take that bowl home.
The idea is that keeping the bowl will be a reminder that every time you pull it from the cabinet, you’ll remember why it exists in the first place: because circumstances can make it difficult for some of our neighbors to keep their own bowls filled.
That’s an important reminder in Garrett County.
Since we live in a place that welcomes visitors to beautiful homes, busy restaurants, ski slopes, golf courses and a lake surrounded by recreation and vacation properties, it can be easy to look at that version of Garrett County and assume
everyone here is doing OK.
They aren’t.
During our conversation, Garrett County Community Action President Chris Mullett shared a number that stopped me: approximately 4,700 of Garrett County’s roughly 28,000 residents experience some measure of food insecurity.
Food insecurity doesn’t necessarily mean someone has no food at all. It can mean the household’s resources don’t stretch to the end Bowls Painted for the Upcoming Empty Bowls Event Bowls Painted for the Upcoming Empty Bowls Event of the month. It can mean someone regularly skips a meal because there isn’t enough. And when food is uncertain, it is rarely the only challenge a household is facing.
Years ago, I participated in a poverty simulation. My “husband” in the exercise had a check I needed to cash. I got to the bank only to discover he hadn’t signed it.
No signature. No cash.
But I had already used my bus ticket to get there.
It was pretend. I knew the simulation would end. I knew I would go home afterward.
And yet, probably a decade later, I still remember that moment because of the chain reaction caused by one tiny thing going wrong. When there is no cushion of money, transportation, time or people to call for help, a small problem isn’t always small.
That is part of what Garrett County Community Action is trying to address through the 360 Access Hub at 360 Liberty Street in Oakland.
The Hub was created through a partnership involving Community Action, the Garrett County Health Department and Maryland Physicians Care. Food assistance is part of its work, but the larger idea is to use that immediate need as a doorway to other resources.
Someone who needs food may also need help with housing. Transportation. Utilities. Financial counseling. Health services.
Instead of sending someone from agency to agency to retell their story and figure out the system on their own, the goal is to make connections while they’re there.
As Mullett put it during our conversation, whatever door someone comes through should be the right door.
Money raised through this first Empty Bowls event will support Community Action’s food programs, including the 360 Access
Hub, congregate meals for seniors and Meals on Wheels.
The organizers have set a goal of raising $10,000 this first year.
But listening to Laurie, Judy and Chris talk, it was clear that they are already imagining what this could become.
Mullett has seen it happen elsewhere. He recalled an Empty Bowls program in Monongalia County, West Virginia, that began by raising about $4,700 and has since grown dramatically, eventually becoming a funding resource for food pantries throughout that county.
His hope is that Garrett County can build something lasting, too.
There’s another part of Empty Bowls that I like just as much as the fundraiser itself is that it takes people to make it happen.
People making bowls. People painting them. Restaurants donating soup. Volunteers setting up, serving and cleaning. Businesses sponsoring the event. People sitting down together to eat.
Community Works Garrett is the organization that connects people with short-term service opportunities and will provide many of those volunteers.
There isn’t a requirement to volunteer every week or commit to a particular organization long-term. Community Works Volunteers receive information about upcoming projects and participate when they can.
A highlight for the Community Works Team is seeing who may never have met otherwise end up working beside one another.
By the time you’re reading this, my bowl should be finished and ready to become part of Empty Bowls and I’m asking each person to purchase a ticket. Even if you cannot attend, a ticket can be purchased and donated to someone in need of a ticket.
Adult tickets are $35 and children’s tickets are $25. Each guest gets to choose a bowl, enjoy the meal and take the bowl home.
Pick a bowl. Eat some soup. Meet somebody you don’t know. Take the bowl home and let it remind you that Garrett County is more than the part of it we each see every day.
And if you can’t go, buy the ticket anyway and give someone else a seat at the table.
Because 4,700 of our neighbors experiencing food insecurity is a big number. It can feel like the kind of problem that is too large for one person to do much about. But one ticket isn’t.
One meal isn’t. One bowl isn’t. And maybe that’s the point.
Tickets, donated tickets, and sponsorship opportunities are available at emptybowlsgarrett.org.
From the September issue of the Lakefront Magazine.