How I found my inner dinner-lady

This is the time of year we all start thinking about self-improvement. Shifting the excess weight we added over Christmas. Finally joining the gym. Personally I have decided this is going to be the year I learn how to Rhumba.

But there are other ways of improving your own lot and that of others.

Over the festive period — for the fourth year in a row — I volunteered at Crisis at Christmas. I can honestly say it’s the best thing I do all year. It’s exhausting and satisfying and draining and enlivening. Sometimes it’s ridiculously fun and exciting, sometimes boring and cold. (Gap duty, where you literally stand in a gap, often in the cold, to stop guests going where they aren’t allowed, is no one’s favourite job. But it is essential).

Homelessness is on the rise in London. The centre I work in is one for those with drug and alcohol dependencies. We see some of our guests year after year, which is both lovely and sad. But every year we give people the advice they need, and guide them into AA or NA meetings, towards doctors, opticians, podiatrists and more.

At the beginning of the week, all the returning volunteers are bright eyed and bushy tailed. At the end of it, we’re all knackered. Meanwhile the guests have had haircuts, manicures, showers, new clothes and, above all, sleep. They look considerably better than we do.

Being a volunteer isn’t always easy. Some of our guests are delightful. Some are less so, because they’re human with all that entails. Sometimes they just don’t want to be patronised by a well-meaning middle class git like me and I can’t say I blame them. Understanding when to back off is as important a skill with guests as when to intervene.

Most of the time though, being a Crisis volunteer is simply wonderful. You are busy for every moment of your eight-hour shift. This year I did everything from scraping plates clean (I am a born dinner lady, as it turns out) to manning the back office. I stood on the gates and checked wristbands in the cold and stood in the stultifyingly warm cinema. I chatted to loads of guests, talking them into getting advice and services, as well as just chatting. I danced with them, sang with them and played a great deal of bingo with them too.

Having done this volunteering for a few years now, there are a lot of people who return to the same centre and shift year after year. It’s a cliché, but we really do feel like a family. We work long hours together and, as a result, we have bonded over the years. Seeing my friends again as I started my first shift was just lovely (and less conflicted than seeing familiar guests).

It was working at Crisis that has made me sign up for other volunteering opportunities over the year. It brings a sense of personal fulfilment that I have not found anywhere else. Especially while politics all feels so bleak and nasty, I missed that sense of making a difference in the world.

So as you think about what you want to do differently in 2020, I can’t urge you enough to consider volunteering. Do something you feel passionate about — homelessness is a cause close to my heart, but there are thousands of excellent causes that need help.

Sure, sometimes you will just be standing in the cold in a gap. But the conversation you have in that gap could change someone’s life. There’s nothing less boring than that.

For more volunteering opportunities contact Community Service Volunteers.