Take On Life

Hi everyone,

Don’t be fooled by the matrix of scaffolding in front of The Salvation Army thrift store on Main Street and the ghost-town appearance of the first floor.

The Danbury landmark is still open Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

But it’s hardly business as usual.

The thrift store, in true Phoenix-like fashion, is undergoing a $400,000 renovation that is expected to be done by March, according to Lt. Col. Tim Raines, commander of The Salvation Army’s adult rehabilitation ministry for the Eastern territory.

So while Jim Maloney’s new health clinic takes shape across the street, The Salvation Army store is getting ready for a major unveiling of its own with new fixtures, a new layout and a new attitude.

Suddenly, the smell of neglect has been replaced by the smell of fresh paint and a fresh start.

This is another encouraging sign for the revitalization of downtown Danbury, especially for local families trying to stretch their budgets in an unforgiving economy.

“We’re trying to invest in the community,” Raines said Thursday night. “At the same time, we’re aware of the image of the old Salvation Army thrift store and we’re trying to reinvent it. We’ve changed the name to the Family Store.

“The whole concept is being changed. It’s going to be more like a department store, where people of all classes can go shop and find a bargain.”

Consider: As I shuffled through the racks of clothing Thursday night — the pants, shirts, coats and everything else have been moved upstairs after being downstairs for years — I found a Ralph Lauren women’s barn coat with a brown corduroy collar. The blue coat was in gently used condition, if not better.

The yellow ticket with “Family Store” printed on it read, $14.99. But because yellow tickets were half off Thursday, the coat was a steal at $7.50.

Anyone could see that.

I’m glad Raines and The Salvation Army folks saw fit to upgrade the lighting here. It would’ve been a shame to skimp on the lights and update everything else.

The place is so much brighter now and the metaphor for the future — whether that future belongs to The Salvation Army, this corner of Main Street, or the people whose lives are changed by the missions supported by these retail purchases — is unmistakable.

“This is one of the stores that we’ve owned for a long time and we felt it was time to clean it up and spruce it up,” Raines said. “We have a commitment to the community and we think this investment will help us do that.”

The Salvation Army’s commitment to the community, of course, includes free treatment for people fighting alcohol and drug addictions, among other demons.

“It’s a win-win situation for the whole community. Everyone benefits,” Raines said. “It’s going to be a brand-new store with the old prices.

“This is a process we’re doing all over Connecticut, right now. We just opened a brand-new store in Newington in November and we’re opening another one in Willimantic next month.”

But right here in Danbury, in a historic brick building dating to 1932, The Salvation Army is priming its walls and powdering its nose for a new era of helping people.

To read more about the new Salvation Army store in downtown Danbury, check out my “Take on Life” column Friday, exclusively in the print edition of The News-Times.

Hi everyone,

It didn’t take very long, maybe a second or two, before Daniela Macia’s 10-year-old eyes spotted one of the brass rings of childhood in Danbury — a big red button to push with no waiting.

I suppose it doesn’t get much better than that for a kid at Stew Leonard’s, the grocery store carnival with free samples, fresh food and all that mechanized magic.

For nearly a quarter century now, Daniela and thousands of other kids at Stew’s have run up to a mega-sized box of Twinkies and pushed that same big red button.

“Hi! I’m Twinkie the Kid!” the cowboy hat-wearing snack cake declares to Danbury’s next generation of kids.

But will there be a generation after Daniela? And how about her 7-year-old sister, Natalia?

SEE TWINKIE FOR YOURSELF: http://youtu.be/rGo-NYQPicw

Sadly, Twinkie the Kid is the face of a dying brand with a flawed business model to match.

For the second time in almost eight years, the parent company of Twinkies — first it was Interstate Bakeries, now it’s Hostess — announced last week that it is seeking bankruptcy protection.

Hostess listed $860 million in debt in papers filed with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, according to The Associated Press.

That’s a lot of Twinkies.

As far as I can tell, there are no butter cream buyouts coming from the President’s Council on Physical Fitness.

Times — and tastes — have changed for Twinkie the Kid, you see.

Gone are the days when Twinkies filled every kid’s school lunch box. Gone are the days when kids washed down their Twinkies with grape Kool-Aid or Tang, the SunnyD of the ’70s.

These days, despite near-epidemic problems with childhood obesity, apple slices, carrot sticks and celery stalks smothered in peanut butter have become the snacks of choice in many American households.

And yet, there is something irresistible about a talking snack cake wearing cowboy boots, even at 150 calories and 4.5 grams of fat.

I suppose one part of it is nostalgia. The other part, at least for me, is the wide-eyed radar kids use when they run up to push those big red buttons.

As much as Clover the Cow — the bovine in the back of Stew Leonard’s where kids tug the rope to elicit a foghorn from her throat — and the Chiquita Banana lady with the Carmen Miranda headdress, Twinkie the Kid is a headliner here.

Just don’t try buying Twinkies at Stew Leonard’s.

The company hasn’t sold them for several years, Meghan Bell, a company spokeswoman, said Friday afternoon.

But there’s no denying Twinkie the Kid’s popularity with those who love his slow-motion, jack-in-the-box entrance.

For those new to Twinkie the Kid, just look for the giant ear of corn suspended from the ceiling in the produce section at Stew Leonard’s; Twinkie the Kid is nestled right around the corner.

“I remember growing up with Twinkies. They were a part of my childhood,” said Felipe Macia, 45, a banker from New York and the father of Daniela and Natalia.

“But it’s a different world now. Watch this: Do you know what a Twinkie is?” Macia asked Daniela.

The little girl shook her head. So did her sister.

But not Shira Newman.

Newman is 31 years old and lives in New York. She’s been coming to Stew Leonard’s ever since her family moved to Somers, N.Y., when she was 2 years old.

On Friday, she visited Twinkie the Kid with her parents, Donna and Steve Bookin, and her 9-month-old son, Max.

“The store wasn’t this big when we first started coming here. It was just a tent where they sold produce — fruits and vegetables, things like that,” Donna Bookin said, adding with a laugh, “I came here so much they built a bigger building.”

Over and over — at least five or six times — Newman pushed the big red button to summon Twinkie the Kid.

And, every time, Max — in a nod to the cadence of Ridgefield’s Maurice Sendak — smiled his beautiful smile.

Sure, Twinkies are hardly the food pyramid’s missing link, proprietary cream filling and all.

But for those who remember Twinkie the Kid and a simpler time, it’s still fun to press that big red button at Stew Leonard’s.

Hi everyone,

When was the last time you parked your car and ran several errands at once?

Last week?

Last year?

Never?

And, for the record, a trip to the mall doesn’t count, at least not in this context.

In some local downtowns — Ridgefield, Danbury, New Milford and Bethel, for example — it’s pretty easy to grab some lunch, visit the bank, hit the library and get a haircut in one walking tour.

Not only is it convenient, it also saves gas, promotes exercise, support local merchants and reduces those choking emissions spilling out of your exhaust pipe.

What’s not to love here?

This is how U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood describes these neighborhoods:

“Livability means being able to take your kids to school, go to work, see a doctor, drop by the grocery (store) or post office, go out to dinner and a movie, and play with your kids at the park, all without having to get into your car.

“Livability means building the communities that help Americans live the lives they want to live — whether those communities are urban centers, small towns or rural areas.”

A website — www.walkscore.com — has taken the livability idea and run with it. Or at least, walked with it.

The website has devised a system that measures the “walkability” of any address and gives it a Walk Score from 0 to 100.

Go ahead, try it for yourself. Enter any address in the world.

It could be your house. It could be your town hall.

It could be the Tower of London, which has a Walk Score of 92, by the way.

Closer to home, The News-Times, at 333 Main St. in Danbury, came back with a Walk Score of 94.

That’s not so surprising given the number of retail stores, restaurants, banks, law offices and the like on Main Street.

This is good news for the future of downtown Danbury. If nothing else, the high score validates downtown’s broad access to walkable services.

And yet, it’s also evidence that Danbury needs more downtown housing — both new development and development over commercial space — for residents to take advantage of these benefits and pump money into the local economy.

Given the time, the money (the biggest obstacle here) and a clear, consistent vision, the bones and the potential are present to make downtown Danbury special.

Really special.

“Downtown has enormous potential, but you have to do the right things, and you have to do them well,” Dennis Elpern, the city’s director of planning, said Thursday.

“We certainly have an interest in more downtown housing — for singles and young adults and for empty-nesters and retirees,” Elpern added. “The basis is already there for future development.

“We want to attract new people who want to live downtown. We also want to attract people from the outlying communities to come to downtown,” he said.

Make no mistake, none of this is easy.

Many of these downtown ideas exist solely in the Main Street Renaissance Task Force Report released in 2010. But the important part is that they exist, a dynamic blueprint for the future.

Understand, there’s already progress being made in downtown Danbury — and here’s the best part — it’s all within walking distance of Main Street.

From Brookview Commons and the updated shopping plaza at 33 Crosby St., to the transformation of the old police department lot into a health care center, senior housing and a Union Saving Bank office, progress is being made downtown.

The complete revitalization of downtown Danbury is still years away, of course. But rest assured, it’s getting closer each and every day.

You might even say it’s almost within walking distance.

Hi everyone,

Editor’s Note: This column first appeared in the Dec. 30, 2011, print edition of The News-Times.

If you’ve been craving a burger and a cherry limeade from a Sonic restaurant in Danbury, don’t expect to place your order anytime soon.

At least not until the spring or summer, anyway.

After nearly 18 months of false starts, nothing has changed for the Sonic drive-in proposed for the Newtown Road parking lot near Xpect Discounts.

No groundbreaking.

No restaurant.

No anything.

Here’s why: Xpect Discounts, the anchor tenant in the shopping center owned by Danbury-Newtown, LLC, was upset with the deal ironed out by the Daser Restaurant Group, the Sonic franchisee, and Danbury-Newtown, LLC.

In fact, Xpect Discounts sought a permanent injunction to block Sonic from coming, even though Danbury officials approved the site plans for Sonic months ago.

Sources claim the dispute is largely over parking space. Sonic’s business model is a pure drive-in operation, with outdoor tables and carhop service. There is no indoor seating at Sonic restaurants.

The two sides in the dispute — Danbury-Newtown, LLC, and Marc Glassman Inc., the Cleveland-based parent company of Xpect Discounts — recently wrapped up a trial at state Superior Court in New Haven before William Hadden, judge trial referee.

Hadden hasn’t issued his ruling yet, so it is unclear when — or even if — Sonic burgers will ever hit the grill at the Newtown Road location.

“I only know what I hear, but it’s my understanding all the legal issues have been resolved,” Danbury Mayor Mark Boughton said (Dec. 29). “I just checked with my staff last week.

“We really haven’t heard too much from Sonic. Hopefully, they’ll do something there in the spring,” Boughton said. “But if that site doesn’t work out, we’ll contact the franchisee and find another site for them.”

Doug Slater, one of the principals of the Daser Restaurant Group, said (Dec. 29) he is “dying” to set up a Sonic drive-in restaurant in Danbury.

“I don’t have any information to tell you, but we’re hopeful,” Slater said. “If I gave you a time frame, I’d be pulling it out of (thin air).”

Listen, I get that it costs big bucks — really big bucks — to bankroll one of these Sonic franchises. According to the Sonic website, there’s a $45,000 franchise fee and a total up-front investment between $710,000 and $3 million.

On top of that, Oklahoma-based Sonic Industries, LLC, requires royalty fees of 4 to 5 percent and advertising fees of 5.9 percent, according to the Sonic website.

But right now — just hours away from 2012 — it looks like Danbury’s Sonic boom is more like a Sonic bust, cherry limeade and all.

In contrast, there were 963 Sonic drive-in locations in Texas, 270 in Oklahoma and 223 in Tennessee as of last May, according to the Sonic website — 45 states in all.

Slater is eager to add to those numbers.

Along with owning the Sonic franchise rights to Danbury, Daser Restaurant Group already owns Sonic restaurants in Kingston, N.Y. — the first Sonic in New York state — and sister properties in Wappingers Falls, N.Y., and Newburgh, N.Y.

The Daser Restaurant Group, however, isn’t part of Sonic of Connecticut, which includes existing Sonic drive-ins in Wallingford and Manchester, and plans to open future locations in Milford, Berlin, New Haven, Southington, Enfield and the Hartford area.

“I’m optimistic about Sonic coming to Danbury. We want them here,” Boughton said. “I think the public is pretty jazzed up about them coming, too.”

Just don’t expect to place your Sonic order anytime soon.

Hi everyone,

For years, casino trips have been a gold mine for tour bus companies in Connecticut and across the Northeast.

But just imagine if you didn’t have to drive two hours each way on a bus from Danbury to gamble.

Pretty soon, you won’t have to imagine it. All you’ll have to do is turn on your computer and let it ride.

In the wake of the U.S. Justice Department’s Dec. 23 decision that Connecticut and other states can legalize online gaming — excepts sports gambling — two things have become pretty clear:

1.) Gambling generates a whole lot of money. Last year, $1.2 billion was spent on lottery tickets, pari-mutuel bets and charitable gaming in Connecticut, according to state officials. What’s more, those figures don’t count all the money spent at Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun, because those casinos are operated under the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act.

2.) Gambling can be very dangerous, especially for people with addiction problems. Although the state of Connecticut currently spends about $1.9 million to promote responsible gambling and to help those with gambling addictions, that’s still only about 1/1,000th of the amount spent on gambling in Connecticut.

Listen, I understand money is tight and the economy is tenuous in Connecticut. I also understand Gov. Dannel P. Malloy and the General Assembly continue to look down the barrel of burgeoning budget gaps.

But for many folks, online gaming amounts to a predatory means of generating revenue. There will be consequences when online gaming comes to Connecticut in the days ahead, make no mistake about it.

“With online gambling, you’ll have it all — the casino, the card room, the horse room, everything except sports betting — and you’ll have it 24 hours a day,” said Jim Crean, director of outreach and community relations for the Danbury-based Midwestern Connecticut Council on Alcoholism and an expert on gambling addiction.

“All you’ll have to do is go from your living room to your computer room. The ease of access will make it much more dangerous,” Crean said. “The more states look to increase revenues (with online gaming), the more it potentially affects the people who can least afford to spend the money.”

Crean cautions that he is not anti-gambling, but rather, pro-responsible gambling. At the same time, he has seen too many lives destroyed by games of chance.

With in-home access coming to a Connecticut computer near you, expect those numbers only to go up.

Exponentially.

Malloy, meanwhile, defends his decision of supporting online gaming as a state revenue stream in 2012 and beyond.

He knows if Connecticut doesn’t buy in, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey and Rhode Island will be climbing over each other for Connecticut’s gambling dollars.

“I’m not a big proponent of gaming. But what’s going to happen, based on the change in position by the U.S. Justice Department … is that there’s going to be online gaming in the United States,” Malloy said the other day in Newtown. “So it’s not a question of whether it’s going to happen. It’s quite apparent it’s going to happen.

“Therefore, you’re going to have to ask the next logical question: Who is going to benefit from that?” Malloy said. “And, quite clearly, any number of states have been proponents of online gaming — we have not been previously — but we have to accept the reality that the map has changed.”

Literally and figuratively.

Who needs a two-hour trip to Foxwoods or Mohegan Sun when you can have the same fun with two clicks on your computer?

That’s the $1 million question.

Or worse, it’s the dead-broke question.

“Some people have interpreted things to mean that Connecticut wants to start this. That’s not the case. It really isn’t,” Malloy insisted.

“If you’re asking me, ‘Do I think it’s foreseeable in the future that we may need to spend more money (on gambling awareness and education),’ I think the answer is in the affirmative. What the right level of money is and what the actual challenges will be remain to be seen.”

Dr. Lori Rugle, the state’s director of problem gambling services, said increased spending is critical to addressing the current — and future — gambling addicts in Connecticut.

“We need to do a lot of educating of the public about the dangers of online gambling,” Rugle said Friday. “This isn’t a risk-free activity.”

Indeed, it’s not.

“We usually don’t see people (for treatment) until they’ve run out of money,” Crean said. “There’s more of a social stigma with gambling addiction than there is with alcohol addiction.

“There’s no smell on your breath. Nobody is stumbling around from it. There’s no dilation of the pupils.”

Granted, online gaming revenue would help Connecticut’s bottom line. There are budgets to balance and bills to pay, after all.

But don’t think for a minute this isn’t blood money from those who are already bleeding.

Hi everyone,

Ed Robbs can still taste those big pots of Indiana chili his mother used to make in Terre Haute.

Ed Robbs

The chili — at least, that’s what his mother called it — was a staple of his 1950s childhood, the kind of thoughtful meal that filled a little boy’s belly and his heart at the same time.

But instead of ground beef smothered in tomato sauce, Mary Rose Robbs made her chili with a tomato soup base and then thickened it with spaghetti and crackers.

With seven kids to raise by herself, Mrs. Robbs had no choice but to be creative in the kitchen. Anything to stretch a meal. Or a dollar.

Or a boy’s imagination.

Ed Robbs, the principal of Broadview Middle School in Danbury, credits his mother for encouraging him to work hard in school and to help the less fortunate.

“It’s not about how much you have,” Robbs said Thursday from his office, shaking his head for emphasis. “It’s about what you do with what you have.”

Robbs, 68, has lived by those words his whole career — first as a science teacher in Los Angeles and later as a school administrator, including the last 13 years at Broadview.

“This is what I do. I work with kids and I love my job,” said Robbs, who lives in Danbury with his wife, Myrtle. “When I first came here in 1998, I said that I’d stay for five years. Well, here I am today. I’ll stay as long as they want me and as long as I feel I’m adding value to the school.”

On Jan. 16, Robbs will be honored by the Connecticut Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday Commission with its Humanitarian Award for his work with schoolchildren. The event will start at 11 a.m. at the State Capitol.

“To be honest with you, my first reaction was embarrassment,” Robbs said. “To be singled out for doing something I love — working with kids — was extremely unexpected. But after it sunk in, I felt very, very honored.”

Robbs also serves on the board of trustees for The Hord Foundation, which has given out $3.5 million in college scholarships to more than 2,500 African-American students from Greater Danbury over the years. He’s even served as chairman of The Hord Foundation’s scholarship program.

“It’s about education. It’s about making good choices in your life,” Robbs said Thursday before visiting Shelter Rock Elementary School to tell his story to a class of fifth-grade boys.

“I started off like many kids in Danbury. We were very poor. Welfare poor,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t make a difference in the world and make it a better place.”

Robbs prepared a special PowerPoint presentation for the boys at Shelter Rock School. Fittingly, there were lots of quotes from King.

Along with his mother’s love and her rib-sticking Indiana chili, Robbs will tell you about the profound influence King had on his life. And the lives of so many others.

“Ed is a very caring person. He knows all his kids and they know him,” said Sal Pascarella, Danbury’s Superintendent of Schools. “He wants his kids not only to be good students, but to be good young people. That caring comes across in everything he does. I am very proud to call him a colleague.”

Robbs grew up just as the country was entering the civil rights era, a time when water fountains were marked “White” and “Colored” in Terre Haute and elsewhere.

Not long after four young black men grabbed national headlines in 1960 with a sit-in at the whites-only lunch counter at Woolworth’s in Greensboro, N.C., Robbs and others staged their own sit-in at the Woolworth’s in Terre Haute.

“Before that happened, we didn’t know anything about (sit-ins). We had no idea,” Robbs said. “We didn’t know that we couldn’t eat at Woolworth’s because we didn’t have the money to eat there in the first place.”

As a boy, Robbs helped bring money into the house by carrying coal for two women down the street in Terre Haute. He also rolled out of bed at 4 a.m. for a paper route and worked at the local A&P grocery store.

A lifetime later, Robbs has five different pictures of King on the wall in his Broadview office. The pictures are a constant reminder of the power of change.

“One of the things King said that has always stuck with me is to be a servant,” said Robbs, who was teaching in Los Angeles during the Watts riots of 1965.

“You don’t have to be rich to make a difference. You don’t even need a college degree. Everyone can be great. You just have to serve. That’s all you need.”

Maybe so, but a big bowl of Indiana chili can’t hurt.

Hi everyone,

I don’t remember exactly when I saw “A Christmas Carol” for the first time at Hartford Stage, but it was at least a dozen years ago.

I lived in Carmel, N.Y., at the time, but as I pleasantly discovered, the hour-plus drive was well worth the performance of Bill Raymond alone.

Bill Raymond (Photo courtesy of Hartford Stage)

Raymond, a fixture of the production for the past 14 years, is perfectly cast as Ebenezer Scrooge in this timeless tale of reflection and redemption.

Raymond makes Scrooge human — who among us hasn’t been wounded by one heartache or another? — the moment he awakes in his bed chambers.

It is Raymond’s skillful transformation from curmudgeon to champion that makes “A Christmas Carol” at Hartford Stage a holiday winner and a tradition in my family.

Wrap Raymond’s performance around a terrific cast, including talented and versatile veterans Robert Hannon Davis, Johanna Morrison, Michelle Hendrick and Rebecka Jones, and “A Christmas Carol” is worth the trip to Hartford.

But here’s the thing: If you still want to see “A Christmas Carol” at Hartford Stage this holiday season, you had better hurry. This year’s run ends Friday.

As I write this post, there are just six performances left: Tuesday at 2 and 7:30 p.m., Wednesday at 2 p.m., Thursday at 7:30 p.m., and Friday at 2 and 7:30 p.m.

For ticket information, visit www.hartfordstage.org or call 860-527-5151. 

One year, my two sons and I happened to meet Raymond after the show in the parking garage. He couldn’t have been nicer and more gracious to my boys, and I appreciated his kindness.

I grew up watching “A Christmas Carol” with my mom. She likes the 1938 classic with Reginald Owen and the 1951 version with Alastair Sim. To me, the black-and-white cinematography only made the storytelling more convincing.

Later on, I looked forward to watching George C. Scott and Mr. Magoo — thank you, Jim Backus! — in colorized depictions.

But at the end of the day, Bill Raymond’s live performance as Scrooge — he deftly mixes humor with humanity in his portrayal – will always be my favorite.

Hi everyone,

Patricia Fernandes seemed to have it all.

She owned a successful Danbury restaurant, Casa Portuguesa, better known as the old Emilio’s to some in the city.

She also had a loving husband, Luis, and two beautiful children, Patrick and Valentina.

But after watching a family friend — a beautiful 32-year-old girl from Brazil – succumb to blood cancer two weeks after being diagnosed, Fernandes knew she needed more in her life.

Patricia Fernandes needed to make a difference in the world.

“She was my youngest sister’s best friend. One day, she noticed two bruises — one on each hand — but she didn’t think anything about it,” Fernandes said. “She was taking her niece to the hospital and that’s when the doctor noticed the bruises.

“They did some tests on her and she was diagnosed right there at the hospital. Just like that, two weeks later, she died.”

Fernandes thought long and hard about starting over. She knew it was going to be hard. She also knew it was her only option.

After selling the restaurant and searching her heart — as well as the “help wanted” ads — Fernandes found her calling with the Icla da Silva Foundation, a New York-based bone marrow donor recruitment center.

“I worked a couple of part-time jobs at first — and I said a lot of prayers — until I finally found something special,” said Fernandes, 42. “With the Icla da Silva Foundation, I found what my heart needed.”

Today, Fernandes is a recruitment specialist for bone marrow donor registry drives in Connecticut, Massachusetts and part of New York. And she loves her work.

Fernandes is currently helping two patients in Danbury — one from Chile and another from Ecuador. In both cases, a sibling emerged as the matching bone marrow donor.

“We pretty much focus on the minority communities,” Fernandes said. “But we’ll help anyone who needs us, including those people who don’t have the money or insurance.”

It’s daunting enough to find a matching bone marrow donor outside a family member.

According to the National Bone Marrow Registry, the chances of finding a matching donor who is not a family member in the registry can be 1 in 20,000 or even higher.

“It’s like winning the lottery,” Fernandes said.

Only sweeter.

The odds of finding a matching donor for people of color are tougher, Fernandes said, because about 80 percent of all bone marrow donors — 6 million — are white.

Donors of color represent the other 20 percent — about 1.5 million donors — according to the National Marrow Donor Program.

You do the math.

That doesn’t mean it’s a hopeless cause, Fernandes said. But it does mean anyone from 18 to 60 can make a difference.

By the way, the initial screening to be a bone marrow donor doesn’t hurt. I registered about a year ago, after wiping a cotton swab inside my mouth to collect some cheek cells.

That’s it, folks. End of story.

Fernandes has two bone marrow donor registry drives set up in Danbury in the coming weeks.

The first will be held Dec. 17 from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Fernandes Food Store at 99 Town Hill Ave.

The second will be held Jan. 14 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Case Benfica at 331 Main St.

“When I first started about a year ago, I used to get very emotional,” said Fernandes, who typically runs 15 drives a month, although she once worked three in one day in Massachusetts. “Of course, somebody would always start crying. And then I’d start crying. And then everybody would start crying.

“I’m better now, but the stories still touch your heart,” she said. “I’m here to help the community, no matter where you come from. The most important job we do is to help people who are sick find a donor.”

In this season of caring for others, the greatest gift you might be able to give someone is to wipe the inside of your cheek with a cotton swab.

On a larger scale, think of it this way: If your church or college or company can open its doors to a blood drive, it can do the same for a bone marrow donor drive.

“If someone wants to host a drive, I’m here to help,” Fernandes said. “All you need is two or three volunteers and a table. Just open the door for me, that’s all I need. I’ll do the rest.”