Linda Ashe-Ford recalls the bleak time six years ago when she hadn’t yet caught the holiday spirit. “My husband was sick, and my two sons were facing struggles in their own lives. Christmas wasn’t going to be much fun.”
Around that time, Linda and a friend had decided to make sure that adopted and foster teens in Southern Maine would get some gifts for Christmas. Carolyn Ecklund, her pastor at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Brunswick, had agreed to let Linda make a pitch to the congregation.
So Linda cut out some round pieces of paper, shaped like Christmas tree balls, and put them on a tree in the vestibule of the Church. On each paper ornament, she wrote the name and age of a teen and a present they had expressed interest in. She put the ornaments on the tree before the early 8 o’clock service.
At the service, she talked about the effort to collect presents for the forgotten teens. “People like to give presents to younger kids,” she explained, “and organizations like Toys for Tots and the Salvation Army don’t take care of the older kids.” She said that anyone who wanted to help could take a paper ornament off the tree and buy a gift.
After the service, Linda went out to check on the tree. All the paper ornaments were gone. Every single one. She was overcome. The people in the congregation had heard her message. “That made my Christmas,” she says today, tears welling up at the memory. She then rushed to put more paper ornaments on the tree before the next service.
Linda, who currently serves as the Coordinator of the After School Course at the Friends School in Portland, has worked in organizations serving young people throughout her career. She notes that foster teens face special challenges. “Some of them have been moved in and out of homes several times, never feeling a sense of stability. Others are in ‘kinship care’, meaning they live with a grandparent or other relative. Their parents couldn’t taken care of them because of addictions or for other reasons. Kids in the latter group are not in ‘the system,’ so the caretakers are often not even aware of the services available.”
Linda, herself, knows something about adoption because she and her husband James adopted two boys, Elijah and Ethan. “We knew that there might be issues getting pregnant,” she explains, “We didn’t want to spend a lot of money trying to have a child; we just wanted to build a family.”
Today, the program has expanded to cover 25 young people, ages 10 to 18. Each kid writes down three things they need or want and then adds a special “wish.” This past year, most of the items requested were in the definite “need” category, things like snow pants or a winter jacket or warm socks. Linda recalls one family which had one winter coat for three children, so every day they had to decide which child most needed the coat.
Linda also notes that for the “want” category, the actual gift is less important than the love shown behind the gift. “A girl might request a doll, say, or a boy might request a ball, but it’s not critical that the giver buy a precise kind of doll or ball that has been chosen from a retailer’s web site or catalogue. We’re not talking fancy iPhones here. In the ‘wish’ category, the teen might request something like, ‘anything that says Batman or Patriots or Nike’ or ‘a gift certificate to Roy Rogers.'”
Linda stresses that this program is totally run by volunteers, although the umbrella organization is Adoptive & Foster Families of Maine, Inc. & The Kinship Program. I asked why she and the other volunteers took on the huge task every year of collecting gifts — or donations for same — and making sure the gifts got into the right hands.
“As a Christian, this is what it’s all about it. We want to make sure there is room at the inn for everyone. We want these forgotten kids to know that someone cares about them and loves them.”
Good words these. The song of an angel.
For anyone interested in contributing to this cause, make a check payable to Adoptive and Foster Families of Maine, and put “Christmas Kids” in the subject line. Send to Adoptive and Foster Families of Maine, 333 Lincoln Ave., Saco, ME 04072.
David Treadwell, a Brunswick writer, welcomes commentary and suggestions for future “Just a Little Old” columns. dtreadw575@aol.com.
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