Speaker 1: You're listening to I Choose Me with Jenny Garth. Hi, everyone,
Speaker 1: welcome to I Choose Me. This podcast is all about
Speaker 1: the choices we make and where they lead us. The
Speaker 1: holidays are upon us. It's very easy sometimes I know
Speaker 1: I've fallen victim to this, to get caught up in
Speaker 1: the gifts and the parties and the food, but sometimes
Speaker 1: losing sight of what's really important. My guest today is
Speaker 1: the CEO of an organization that's near and dear to
Speaker 1: my heart and is helping so many people all year long.
Speaker 1: Please welcome Claire Babineau Fontaneau, the CEO of Feeding America,
Speaker 1: to the podcast.
Speaker 2: Hi.
Speaker 1: How are you.
Speaker 3: I'm excellent. I'm really excited about this opportunity.
Speaker 1: Yes, I'm so happy that you're here today. I have
Speaker 1: been a part of Feeding America, working with Feeding America
Speaker 1: for a long long time now. I did a PSA
Speaker 1: for them many moons ago that is still running. I
Speaker 1: still catch it here and there, which I am so
Speaker 1: proud of. And yeah, I've done a lot of like
Speaker 1: you know, going to feed the homeless at the food
Speaker 1: banks and passing out oranges and fruits and just really
Speaker 1: enjoy working with you all.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 3: Well, if you ever hear me interviewed and I say
Speaker 3: thank you to the Freedom American Network, then no, I'm
Speaker 3: talking about you too.
Speaker 1: Then a perfect.
Speaker 3: It includes all the volunteers, it includes every minute, So
Speaker 3: thank you for.
Speaker 1: That so many people. Before we dive in to the
Speaker 1: amazing work you're doing, I want to just kind of
Speaker 1: start at the beginning because your life is so fascinating.
Speaker 1: It's almost like giving back and helping others was your destiny.
Speaker 1: Your parents cared for am I right on this one
Speaker 1: hundred and eight children?
Speaker 2: You are correct?
Speaker 3: Good one hundred and eight And if my mother were
Speaker 3: doing this interview, she would tell you. My mom had
Speaker 3: one hundred and eight children. She was mother to all
Speaker 3: of us, in each of us in extraordinary ways. Her
Speaker 3: beginnings were so humble, but what she understood was how
Speaker 3: powerful one person can be as a force for good
Speaker 3: in the world. She provided a remarkable example for all
Speaker 3: of us. And I'd like to think that I'm finally
Speaker 3: in a role where I get to live into the
Speaker 3: example that she provided.
Speaker 1: Oh that must feel so good. It does. I know
Speaker 1: it's a combination, so everybody's clear. It was a combination
Speaker 1: of birth, adoption, and fostering. She was a mother to
Speaker 1: one hundred and eight, but you know, yes, exactly, exactly
Speaker 1: even think that's possible.
Speaker 3: She did not give birth to one hundred night, thank God.
Speaker 2: Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1: Tell me what it was like growing up in a
Speaker 1: house with so many, so many people.
Speaker 3: It's all I ever have known, by the way, so
Speaker 3: I don't have anything to contrast it with.
Speaker 2: But it was. It was crazy, It was.
Speaker 3: Loud, It was at moments so unified and beautiful. One
Speaker 3: of the special talents that my mother in particular had
Speaker 3: in my father had as well, was a way to
Speaker 3: resonate with each of us in our in our uniqueness. Right,
Speaker 3: So I didn't ever feel like I was part of
Speaker 3: anything that was homogeneous, but I don't think that any
Speaker 3: of us did. The standards that were set for us
Speaker 3: were unique to our talents and our capabilities. We were all,
Speaker 3: every single one of us expected to find ways to
Speaker 3: deploy those talents and to give back to the world.
Speaker 2: It was. It was fascinating.
Speaker 3: So I have friends who are only children who'd come
Speaker 3: to visit me just for the spectacle of it. I
Speaker 3: think in most cases they felt better about their home
Speaker 3: lives when they left because of the chaos that was
Speaker 3: our household. So imagine there were usually about sixteen of
Speaker 3: us at home at a time. Imagine if we ever
Speaker 3: tried to sit at one table, it would be like
Speaker 3: that Walton table, you know, the long, long table with
Speaker 3: benches on the sides, if we were ever going to
Speaker 3: all get around a table, and lots of laughter, lots
Speaker 3: of dancing, lots of singing, though most of us sang badly,
Speaker 3: and I still sing badly, but it was a joyful,
Speaker 3: chaotic home.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, growing up in a large family like that.
Speaker 1: It's clear to see that your mom had such a
Speaker 1: beautiful impact on you. But what kind of lessons do
Speaker 1: you think you learned subconsciously?
Speaker 3: Mmm? You know, that's an interesting one. I hope that
Speaker 3: this doesn't.
Speaker 2: Bring the mood down.
Speaker 3: But it was rad or common for me to go
Speaker 3: to school with a certain number siblings and to come
Speaker 3: home and to have a new person join our family.
Speaker 3: And growing up in that household taught me things about
Speaker 3: how different people need different things emotionally, so that for
Speaker 3: some of my new little brothers or sisters, or sometimes
Speaker 3: my siblings came and triplicate and even among three who
Speaker 3: had biological connections a hug might help or a hug
Speaker 3: might hurt. So we learned as a collective family sensitivity
Speaker 3: around things like that. Another really powerful thing that we
Speaker 3: learned was how beautiful diversity can be, how it can
Speaker 3: in fact be a superpower. Is something I try to
Speaker 3: bring to everything that I do. Is that that realization
Speaker 3: I've I've leveraged those learnings in the for profit world
Speaker 3: when I was executive vice president and of finance and
Speaker 3: treasurer at Walmart. As a lawyer, I leveraged it, and
Speaker 3: I certainly leveraged it today at Feeding America. Diverse teams
Speaker 3: win more, no matter how you define winning, Diverse teams
Speaker 3: win more. And we as a family were a diverse team.
Speaker 3: So nobody could beat us at some of the backyard
Speaker 3: basketball games or softball games or yeah, we we were
Speaker 3: a force. We were of course those babinots.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, Oh it's so good though. So you sort
Speaker 1: of I'm wondering, you know, you went into law school
Speaker 1: I did. Was that you sort of trying to figure
Speaker 1: out what it is that was your unique talent to
Speaker 1: give to the world.
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 3: Absolutely. Now, our grandparents on both sides were sharecroppers and
Speaker 3: didn't have any formal education, and English was not a
Speaker 3: first language for any of them. Folk that French patois creole.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 3: Neither of my parents graduated high school, and the collective
Speaker 3: of all six of those people were absolutely brilliant, and
Speaker 3: it was so obvious. But I got the chance to
Speaker 3: graduate high school and then to go to college. But
Speaker 3: when I was a little girl, I remember so vividly
Speaker 3: talking to my father and telling him in a defiant tone,
Speaker 3: as if I expected him to challenge it, that when
Speaker 3: I grew up, I was going to be a lawyer.
Speaker 3: And I recall that he said, with no hesitation, of
Speaker 3: course you will. Now he did follow it up with
Speaker 3: you argue all the time. At least that way somebody
Speaker 3: will pay you to do it, which I also did
Speaker 3: not forget. But I felt destined to advocate on behalf
Speaker 3: of other people, to use my loud mouth, my big mouth,
Speaker 3: in service of others. I thought I was going to
Speaker 3: be a children's rights advocate, because so many of us
Speaker 3: the normal path to joining our family was because something
Speaker 3: was desperately broken and the one you were born to
Speaker 3: so visible. And I wanted to be a force for
Speaker 3: good for children like us, like my siblings, and me.
Speaker 3: So that's the kind of lawyer I was planning to be.
Speaker 3: That's not exactly the kind of lawyer I became.
Speaker 2: What happened It was the plan.
Speaker 3: I don't even you know, I've been trying to figure
Speaker 3: out what happened. But I always had a head for math,
Speaker 3: and i'd like to believe a heart for people. So
Speaker 3: I went on to law school. And then I was
Speaker 3: sitting in the lobby of my law school, Southern University
Speaker 3: Law Center.
Speaker 2: Go jags out and sitting with.
Speaker 3: My my study partners, and I looked around and you know,
Speaker 3: anybody who's graduated from from Southern who's a tax lawyer?
Speaker 3: Because I kind of liked that area, and nobody could
Speaker 3: think of anybody says, Oh, I think that's what I'll do.
Speaker 3: It was the most random thing, and I'm not right,
Speaker 3: I am not random.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, taxes is not something people are like volunteering to
Speaker 1: exact will.
Speaker 3: So I went to I worked, I graduated law school.
Speaker 3: I hadn't taken any tax classes. By the way, this
Speaker 3: is at the end of law school that I'm thinking
Speaker 3: about this, and I have this epiphany. So I worked
Speaker 3: for Revenue for about nine months and it solidified in
Speaker 3: my mind that it was something that I really enjoyed.
Speaker 3: So then I went back and got another ludgery from
Speaker 3: Southern Methodist University. Southern has to be in every name
Speaker 3: of every school I go to, apparently over in Dallas,
Speaker 3: and I have an lemit taxation.
Speaker 2: And then I.
Speaker 3: Got all of these chances to do all kinds of
Speaker 3: wonderful things. And I knew no one in my family,
Speaker 3: no one that I grew up with, who had the
Speaker 3: kinds of chances that I had, and I kept saying yes.
Speaker 2: To all of them. So I became a tax lawyer.
Speaker 3: I worked in government, I worked in Big four accounting,
Speaker 3: I worked in a major law firm. Walmart was my client.
Speaker 3: They kind of like the way I handled things. They
Speaker 3: asked me to come in house. I said yes to
Speaker 3: that too, So I wound up having this career in law,
Speaker 3: but in commercial litigation, but mostly mostly in tax. And
Speaker 3: then went into Walmart, where I did tax, but I
Speaker 3: did finance, and then became the treasurer there. So none
Speaker 3: of that was part of the grand plan. And I
Speaker 3: was quite the planner.
Speaker 2: As a kid.
Speaker 3: I had a whole plan for what I was going
Speaker 3: to do, and I did not do those things, but
Speaker 3: what I did get to do was was pretty extraordinary.
Speaker 3: And what I get to do now, oh my goodness.
Speaker 3: It actually makes me want to cry every time I
Speaker 3: think about the privilege that it is to get to
Speaker 3: do what I do today.
Speaker 1: I want to talk about that in a second. But
Speaker 1: first of all, you said you have a head for
Speaker 1: math and a heart for people. I love that so much.
Speaker 1: Those are words that I would never say, at least
Speaker 1: the head for math part, but definitely, yes, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: have to come up with something for my head. But
Speaker 1: you said you were working at Walmart. You were there
Speaker 1: for a while, like over ten.
Speaker 3: Years, right, that's right, closer to thirteen.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, And then again, life took a turn that
Speaker 1: you were into expecting. You were diagnosed with cancer in
Speaker 1: twenty fifteen, and your life changed as it does. Yes,
Speaker 1: can you kind of walk us through what? How do
Speaker 1: you get through? What do you do in those moments?
Speaker 3: Wow? Well, first off, what a beautifully aptly titled podcast
Speaker 3: you have here, Because I definitely chose me. I had
Speaker 3: up until the moment of being diagnosed with cancer, I
Speaker 3: was doing things mostly because I thought, well, I can't
Speaker 3: miss this chance. It was less about I want this chance,
Speaker 3: but more about, well, I can't let this chance go.
Speaker 3: I'm going to have to say yes to that. Wow,
Speaker 3: are they asking me to do that? Oh, I'm going
Speaker 3: to have to say yes to that. The first time
Speaker 3: as an actual professional that I set with my thoughts
Speaker 3: and my heart and said, but what do you want
Speaker 3: to do? Not just what's available to you, but what
Speaker 3: do you want to do? And oh, by the way,
Speaker 3: you don't get always to answer this question. One of
Speaker 3: the greatest gifts in the ugliest package of my whole
Speaker 3: life was that cancer, because it was the thing that
Speaker 3: woke me up to the fact that I needed to
Speaker 3: make a me choice there. And the choice I made
Speaker 3: was to leave a very comfortable situation that I had
Speaker 3: in a company that had shown me a lot of grace.
Speaker 3: I'd gotten so many opportunities to grow while I was there.
Speaker 3: I'd been able to achieve financial heightst I never even
Speaker 3: imagined for myself, although I was a big dreamer. It
Speaker 3: provided security not only for myself but also for other
Speaker 3: family members that I was able to lift up and
Speaker 3: send to school and all those things. And that cancer
Speaker 3: said it's time for you.
Speaker 2: To go and I'm like, where am I going? I
Speaker 2: don't even know where I'm going.
Speaker 3: I had been gainfully employed every day of my life
Speaker 3: from my first job I worked. I was gainfully employed
Speaker 3: throughout college, throughout law school, throughout law school. Again, I
Speaker 3: had never had any window of time from the time
Speaker 3: I got my first job that I was not gainful employed.
Speaker 3: And I'm saying, I'm about to take a leap, and
Speaker 3: I don't even know where I'm going. But if I
Speaker 3: stayed at Walmart, if I waited until the right opportunity came,
Speaker 3: I was not going to leave. And I knew that
Speaker 3: I needed to leave.
Speaker 2: So I leaped.
Speaker 3: And I feel so privileged that I could make such
Speaker 3: a choice. Most people don't get to make choices like
Speaker 3: that without concern over whether or not their children are
Speaker 3: going to be able to go to school, or what
Speaker 3: kind of lives they're going to have. I knew that
Speaker 3: I had the security where I could do that and
Speaker 3: jump into the insecurity of what the future was going
Speaker 3: to hold.
Speaker 2: So I did. So I leaked, And.
Speaker 1: You left just for the sole purpose of leaping.
Speaker 3: I left because I knew in my bones that I
Speaker 3: had the ability to be of greater service I'd asked
Speaker 3: myself in the doctor's office when the doctor when the
Speaker 3: pathology report came in, I remember, I'll never forget, of course,
Speaker 3: when the doctor actually used those words and told me
Speaker 3: that I had cancer, I remember that. In a split second,
Speaker 3: I asked myself, what if the best thing I might
Speaker 3: possibly do professionally were the best thing I could possibly
Speaker 3: do at Walmart? Would that be okay? And my answer
Speaker 3: was no? And that's why I leaked. Is I leapt
Speaker 3: towards something in the nonprofit space. I didn't know where
Speaker 3: I was going, but I knew it would be nonprofit.
Speaker 2: That part I knew.
Speaker 3: I knew that I was going to dedicate the rest
Speaker 3: of me to service. I knew that it was going
Speaker 3: to be somewhere in the nonprofit space. I knew that
Speaker 3: I had certain passions, but I didn't know exactly where
Speaker 3: it was going to go. I didn't have a job
Speaker 3: offer or even job prospects. But I also, as I said,
Speaker 3: I knew that if I didn't if I didn't leave,
Speaker 3: I wouldn't leave. I find a way to justify staying.
Speaker 3: So I needed to just go ahead and go, and
Speaker 3: I did.
Speaker 1: It's fascinating that you say that cancer was the best
Speaker 1: gift you ever received in the ugliest package, but it
Speaker 1: seemed to catapult you into this next incredible phase of
Speaker 1: your life. Yes, and what a reward. Ultimately, absolutely, it
Speaker 1: was kind of inevitable when you go through something like that,
Speaker 1: it has such a massive impact on your life. It
Speaker 1: changes how you approach life from that point on. I
Speaker 1: mean today, what choices do you make to stay grounded
Speaker 1: or present in your current life and not just to go, go,
Speaker 1: go and do do do all the time?
Speaker 2: Well, I go go, go a lot, and I do
Speaker 2: do do a lot.
Speaker 3: So I don't know if I'm actually the best person
Speaker 3: to answer that question.
Speaker 1: But what kind of self care do you do?
Speaker 3: Well, what I can tell you I'll talk about self
Speaker 3: care and then I'll tell you about the stuff that
Speaker 3: energizes me. Right, But in terms of self care, there
Speaker 3: been a number of moments when I have felt that
Speaker 3: I needed to keep moving and my body has told me, no,
Speaker 3: you don't, It's time to pause, and to know my
Speaker 3: body well enough to know when it is time. And
Speaker 3: the risk of disappointing people experiencing hunger, the risk of
Speaker 3: not showing up for a partner who's out there on
Speaker 3: the front lines trying to help. That's a hard thing
Speaker 3: for me to say no too. But throughout the pandemic especially,
Speaker 3: there were multiple moments when I had to say yes
Speaker 3: to me, and in order to say yes to me
Speaker 3: so that I could actually sleep that night rather than
Speaker 3: get on another plane, I had to say not yet
Speaker 3: to somebody else. So I love to read, I love
Speaker 3: to walk, I love to dance. I love to sing.
Speaker 3: I mentioned before, I'm not a great singer, but that
Speaker 3: doesn't mean I don't try to sing.
Speaker 1: That's so great. I love it that you don't think
Speaker 1: you're very good, but you still love it.
Speaker 3: Oh, I love it absolutely. The people around me don't
Speaker 3: love it.
Speaker 2: But I, on the other hand, I absolutely love it.
Speaker 3: I love life. I love new people, new things. I
Speaker 3: love to travel. So there's so many outlets that I
Speaker 3: have that are restorative for me. And sometimes the only
Speaker 3: one that I really need is a bath. Sometimes I
Speaker 3: just need to stop, grab a candle mm hmm, and
Speaker 3: go take a bath. Oh hot bath, bubbles.
Speaker 2: Good and salts, salts and bubbles.
Speaker 3: If I feel I've really earned it, these are the things.
Speaker 2: These are the things.
Speaker 1: Oh, I love all those ideas for people tell me,
Speaker 1: how did you come to working with Feeding America.
Speaker 3: Wow, So I'm going to go back to Walmart for
Speaker 3: just a flash, right, So, and well, I'll go back
Speaker 3: one step farther than that. I've always known about Feeding
Speaker 3: America since it started. My parents, as you might imagine,
Speaker 3: were community leaders. As a consequence, Feeding America works inside
Speaker 3: of local communities all across the country. My parents knew
Speaker 3: where the needs were in the little hometown of mine
Speaker 3: of Aplusis, Louisiana, and Feeding America, the Feeding America food
Speaker 3: bank that serves a Kadiana, which is where Appolusis is,
Speaker 3: would actually partner with my parents to do distributions from
Speaker 3: our house.
Speaker 2: Okay, I never imagined that. Fast forward.
Speaker 3: They were called America's Second Harvest at the time, I
Speaker 3: never imagined that I'd be doing this. So I always
Speaker 3: knew about Being America. When I was at Walmart, I
Speaker 3: was on the foundation board. While on the Foundation Board,
Speaker 3: I got to know Feeding America more intimately because we
Speaker 3: were a major investor in Feeding America's work. We provided
Speaker 3: a lot of food and as well as funds. So
Speaker 3: I got to know it that way there and I
Speaker 3: had a conversation with a lady by the name of
Speaker 3: Kathleen McLaughlin, and she had just joined Walmart. And I
Speaker 3: had a practice whenever a new member of the team
Speaker 3: when women joined the officer group at Feeding America, I
Speaker 3: always reached out and took them out to breakfast or
Speaker 3: to lunch or something. So here we are having lunch
Speaker 3: and she's brand new, and she said she talked about
Speaker 3: what she's doing. By now, I do not have any
Speaker 3: idea that I'm going to have cancer, but I'm having
Speaker 3: this conversation with her, and she's talking about what she
Speaker 3: was going to do. And I said, you know, the
Speaker 3: fascinating thing is if I had to guess what I
Speaker 3: would do with my career, it would be more like
Speaker 3: what you're doing than what I'm doing. And she said, really,
Speaker 3: told about my family history, told about what I thought
Speaker 3: I was going to do with my life, etc.
Speaker 2: Etc.
Speaker 3: I thought that conversation was in the past. That's whyried
Speaker 3: I leave Walmart. Years later and I got a phone
Speaker 3: call from a recruiter and the recruiter said, we are
Speaker 3: hiring for the CEO of Feeding America. And there's a
Speaker 3: lady from Walmart. Her name is Kathleen McLoughlin and she
Speaker 3: told us that we should really find you and talk
Speaker 3: to you about this opportunity.
Speaker 1: Wow, like what look at your breakfast? Your outreach to
Speaker 1: the new employee paid off.
Speaker 2: We paid off.
Speaker 3: Oh my goodness, did to pay off. And I consistently
Speaker 3: tell her anytime something powerful and wonderful happens with Feeding America,
Speaker 3: I consistently say a little prayer for Kathleen, and I
Speaker 3: send her a text messages saying, I'm really feeling grateful
Speaker 3: to you today. I'm really feeling grateful because she just
Speaker 3: she remembered what I said and she felt it, and
Speaker 3: then she was in a room that I was not in,
Speaker 3: and she lent her credibility to me in that moment,
Speaker 3: and the rest is kind of history.
Speaker 2: Now here I am.
Speaker 3: I've been here for over six years, and what started
Speaker 3: with that casual breaking of bread with a new person
Speaker 3: has translated into the greatest opportunity for service I've ever
Speaker 3: had in my life.
Speaker 1: That is incredible. How many people in the US are
Speaker 1: suffering from food insecurity.
Speaker 3: At close to fifty million people.
Speaker 1: That's hard to even wrap your mind around.
Speaker 3: Nearly fourteen million children.
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, that's one in five children.
Speaker 3: Yes, it's that I mean and both The most tragic
Speaker 3: part about it, the thing that breaks my heart about
Speaker 3: it and that also gives me hopes, gives me hope,
Speaker 3: is the same thing, which is we could solve it.
Speaker 3: It's actually not one of those things that you'll never
Speaker 3: be able to wrap your arms or you'll never be
Speaker 3: able to solve. No, no, no, no, we can solve this.
Speaker 3: This country has more than enough food to feed every
Speaker 3: single person. We waste so much food, We throw away
Speaker 3: so much food. Being America is actually the largest food
Speaker 3: waste recovery organization in the whole United States of America,
Speaker 3: and we're only recovering about a little over four billion pounds.
Speaker 3: Now that's a lot of food, right it is. Where
Speaker 3: do you recover it from? Oh, we recover it from
Speaker 3: the relationships that we have with all kinds of great organizations.
Speaker 3: So every major retailer in the United States has a
Speaker 3: relationship with Feeding America, through which rather than throw away
Speaker 3: perfectly edible food, they donate that food to us. Every
Speaker 3: major food manufacturer in the United States has a relationship
Speaker 3: with Feeding America. So if you can imagine, let's say
Speaker 3: you're General Mills, who happens to be one of a
Speaker 3: great supporter of ours in many ways. Let's say your
Speaker 3: General Mills and you go to a town and the
Speaker 3: cheerio boxes are bent right perfectly at able ceios. We
Speaker 3: actually have an app that the driver of that that
Speaker 3: of that truck can use to say, to find a
Speaker 3: food bank that's close to them that they can deliver
Speaker 3: that food too rather than get going to waste. So
Speaker 3: that's the way that we do. We have these beautiful
Speaker 3: relationships all across the country with partners who are also
Speaker 3: committed both to resolving issues around waste and making certain
Speaker 3: people in communities get access to food. So that's one
Speaker 3: of the ways that we that we engage with people.
Speaker 3: That's one of the things that we do that I
Speaker 3: find so so powerful is when you're solving for food
Speaker 3: and security, it's an interesting thing in a really powerful
Speaker 3: and beautiful way. There are so many things that you
Speaker 3: solve for when you solve for food and security. Right,
Speaker 3: so you can solve for climate by participating in the
Speaker 3: work that we do, because you can make certain that
Speaker 3: food doesn't go to landfills, but instead the way that
Speaker 3: we're talking about it. We even have a challenge going
Speaker 3: on right now, which is the food rescue challenge, and
Speaker 3: the way that we're phrasing it is from access to
Speaker 3: access right and you get to participate in something I
Speaker 3: get to be a part of that that does that.
Speaker 3: But we also get donated foods directly, We buy a
Speaker 3: lot of food. We participate a lot in federal commodities
Speaker 3: programs where farmers, growers, and producers in the United States
Speaker 3: make certain that people here get access to the food
Speaker 3: that they need to thrive. So lots of different outlets
Speaker 3: for and outreach. That helps to support the network that
Speaker 3: I'm a part of.
Speaker 2: And we need more.
Speaker 3: The lines, unfortunately, have continued to grow. That usually is
Speaker 3: shocking to people. Most people think that the highest rate
Speaker 3: of food and security in this country over the last
Speaker 3: several years would have been during the peak of the pandemic.
Speaker 3: But that's not true. During the pandemic, we as a
Speaker 3: nation had an awareness of food and security because those
Speaker 3: lines were so long on the outsides of buildings. Now
Speaker 3: the lines have gone back to the insides of buildings,
Speaker 3: and people they think they've gone away. The food and
Speaker 3: security rates have gone up because we've actually lowered the
Speaker 3: amount of resources that are available. So it's been it's
Speaker 3: been a real challenge, and yet I see resiliency everywhere
Speaker 3: I go. I see my goodness. I'm so inspired by,
Speaker 3: especially by people experiencing hunger with the heroes that they are.
Speaker 3: The way that these moms making a way out of
Speaker 3: no way, the sacrifices they make, how hard they work
Speaker 3: to make certain that their kids get the things that
Speaker 3: you and I want for ours, It's really inspirational.
Speaker 1: It really is. I mean, with so many people though
Speaker 1: needing help. I think you talked about does it ever
Speaker 1: become overwhelming for you? Like, do you ever just pan?
Speaker 1: I can say I can't do it all and I
Speaker 1: want to do it all. I mean, I can't imagine
Speaker 1: that that's hard to confront, to deal with.
Speaker 3: Oh, of course there are moments, of course there are.
Speaker 3: I in fact, I remember having the good news is
Speaker 3: nobody is expecting me to do it all except me.
Speaker 2: Sometimes.
Speaker 3: There's so many people, i'd say hundreds of thousands of
Speaker 3: people across the country who step up to do this
Speaker 3: work as a part of the anti funder community. But
Speaker 3: I do remember my father. My mother died eleven years ago,
Speaker 3: and my father died two years ago in December, and
Speaker 3: his last illness was dementia, and I won't forget that.
Speaker 3: This is the guy that I went to defiantly and
Speaker 3: told him at twelve, when I don't think a lot
Speaker 3: of people would have bet on my ability to become
Speaker 3: a lawyer. When he, without hesitation, said that he knew
Speaker 3: I would that guy. I returned to him and he
Speaker 3: seemed to be sleeping, and I was really I visited
Speaker 3: him every month during the pandemic. I found a way
Speaker 3: to get there to Opelousi's. So I was in his
Speaker 3: room and I thought he was sleeping, and I said, Daddy,
Speaker 3: I just don't know what to do. I mean, this
Speaker 3: is a lot, you know, people are counting on me.
Speaker 3: How how am I going to step up? Am I
Speaker 3: am I able to do this? And I didn't know
Speaker 3: he was awake, and he opened his eyes, and of
Speaker 3: all moments for him to be lucid, it was that moment.
Speaker 3: And he looked over at me, and I was sitting
Speaker 3: next to his bed, and he said, do you do
Speaker 3: you just just be you clar call me Clarice, just
Speaker 3: be so. Yes, those moments come, but after that moment,
Speaker 3: I can hear him say it to me. And remember
Speaker 3: I said, he's one of the smartest people I've ever known. Figure,
Speaker 3: if he thinks I can do it, there must be
Speaker 3: something inside of me that he saw and surely it's
Speaker 3: still there. So I can go do this.
Speaker 1: M believing in yourself. Yeah, it's hard to do sometimes,
Speaker 1: but it's the key. It is how can people get involved?
Speaker 3: So one way is to donate, right they can go
Speaker 3: to Feeding America dot org and there they can find
Speaker 3: ways to donate. They can donate at the national level,
Speaker 3: or they can donate at the local level, or they
Speaker 3: can do both. If they only have room for one,
Speaker 3: I would say, donate it the community that means the
Speaker 3: most to you. On Feeding America dot org there's actually
Speaker 3: a food bank locator and you just punch in the
Speaker 3: zip code of the community that you care the most about,
Speaker 3: and up will pop up a food bank that's serving
Speaker 3: that community. I know that to be true because Feeding
Speaker 3: America this network serves every single county and parish in
Speaker 3: the wholy United States of America and Puerto Rico. So
Speaker 3: we are there in that community that you care about.
Speaker 3: So you can donate, you can advocate, you can use
Speaker 3: your voices to say that this matters, that you care
Speaker 3: about it. You can make certain that policy makers know
Speaker 3: if this is one of the things that you feel
Speaker 3: that we ought to be united on, not divided about.
Speaker 3: And you can volunteer. Oh my goodness, you talked about
Speaker 3: it earlier. But what feels better than to know for
Speaker 3: a fact, especially in moments when so many things feel
Speaker 3: like they're outside of our control, that you can roll
Speaker 3: your sleeves up and you can be helpful, you can
Speaker 3: be of service, right, and you can. And I have
Speaker 3: an expression I use and maybe someone else used it
Speaker 3: before me, but the giver receives, and it's true, the
Speaker 3: giver receives. There's a special way that I feel a
Speaker 3: special unity in community that I feel that I only
Speaker 3: feel when I've got my sleeves rolled up, and I
Speaker 3: only feel when I'm out there volunteering. So you can donate,
Speaker 3: you can advocate, and you can volunteer, and you can
Speaker 3: find ways to do all three by going to Feeding
Speaker 3: America dot orgy dot Orgie.
Speaker 1: That's right. The work you're doing is phenomenal. So grateful
Speaker 1: to know you and be a small tiny part of
Speaker 1: helping the cause. Before I let you go, Claire, I
Speaker 1: would like to know what was your last I choose
Speaker 1: me moment.
Speaker 4: Oh, you know what, it was probably last night, and
Speaker 4: maybe this isn't a great one, right, but you know,
Speaker 4: I had been traveling.
Speaker 3: I just got back from Atlanta, where I had an
Speaker 3: opportunity to go out and thank one of our real
Speaker 3: big donors, investors in our work. And I was tired,
Speaker 3: and I'd already eaten way more than I should. But
Speaker 3: I got home and as I opened the door. I
Speaker 3: live in Chicago, that's where we're based, primarily opened the
Speaker 3: door and this aroma hit me. It was gumbo in Chicago,
Speaker 3: in Chicago, and my husband was in the kitchen cooking it,
Speaker 3: and I'm thinking, I'm not even hungry. But you know what,
Speaker 3: choosing me was choosing to eat a bowl of that
Speaker 3: gumbo last night. And I did and it was fabulous,
Speaker 3: and I thank my husband, Barry Fontno, for preparing it.
Speaker 3: And every now and then, every now and then, I
Speaker 3: have found choosing me can be something really big, like
Speaker 3: choosing to dedicate my talents to an organization like Feeding America,
Speaker 3: or could be something really small like lighting a candle
Speaker 3: or listening to music or singing, or on a night
Speaker 3: like last night, there was something extra special about choosing
Speaker 3: that bowl.
Speaker 1: Of gumboats the gumbo.
Speaker 2: It was the gumbo. It was the gumbo.
Speaker 1: I really loved our conversation. Thank you. I hope that
Speaker 1: everybody listening I feel the same way as I do.
Speaker 1: I feel hopeful, I feel some sort of piece in
Speaker 1: knowing that you are leading this charge because you are
Speaker 1: truly a gift.
Speaker 3: Oh, thank you so much. I appreciate you and everything
Speaker 3: you do, and thank you to your audience and everything
Speaker 3: they're already doing, solvable challenges that we can do together.
Speaker 3: I'm glad to be a part of it too.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Claire, Thank you. Wow. FACA to Claire is
Speaker 1: so inspiring. I just I love how much passion she
Speaker 1: has for her life and all the wonderful work that
Speaker 1: she's doing with Feeding America, helping so many people. If
Speaker 1: you want to volunteer donate to Feing America, I highly
Speaker 1: suggest it. We'll be sure to leave their info in
Speaker 1: our show notes. As we continue to choose ourselves each week,
Speaker 1: I want to challenge you to making a difference in
Speaker 1: someone else's life this holiday season. There are so many
Speaker 1: incredible organizations out there, and this time of year people
Speaker 1: can really use a helping hand. So whether it's volunteering
Speaker 1: at a food bank, or collecting canned goods, or even
Speaker 1: just cleaning out your closet and donating some of your
Speaker 1: clothes or blankets that you're no longer using. Let's all
Speaker 1: just take some time to think about it this week,
Speaker 1: and let's do something. Let's give back to those around
Speaker 1: us who could use some help, because when we choose
Speaker 1: to give back to others, we're also choosing to acknowledge
Speaker 1: our our own blessings and practice gratitude. Thanks for listening
Speaker 1: to I Choose Me. You can check out all of
Speaker 1: our social links in our show notes. Make sure to
Speaker 1: spread some holiday cheer, and rate us and review us,
Speaker 1: and use the hashtag I Choose Me whenever you feel
Speaker 1: like it. I will be right here next week. I
Speaker 1: hope you'll choose to be here too,