When Dan began volunteering at Freshwinds it was a much smaller charity with only a limited number of staff. Five years later lots of things have changed but not Dan, who is still as enthusiastic and eager to help as ever. Fresh News caught up with Dan to congratulate him on his impressive five years of volunteering at Freshwinds and to hear about his experiences.

I would struggle to tell you what I did five days ago, so I felt very unfair asking Dan to cast his mind back five years to his first days at the charity but he remembered surprisingly clearly his Freshwinds beginnings. His two overriding feelings when he first came in to volunteer were excitement and nervousness, excited to be able to help people but nervous about the new challenge. I don’t think he has ever stopped being excited about coming in to volunteer; in contrast his nerves did not last past his first morning. Dan happily recollects how friendly, welcoming and helpful everyone was when he began, he very quickly felt part of the Freshwinds team or as he more accurately describes it the ‘Freshwinds family’.

For Dan the last five years have flown by and it is not surprising as he has been very busy, working in nearly every part of Freshwinds. He has enjoyed his many different challenges and feels like he is always learning something new. After so many years Dan has many different highlights but what he feels is the best part of volunteering at Freshwinds is meeting so many ‘wonderful caring people’.

After five years of hard work I asked Dan what kept him motivated to give up so much of his own time, he simply replied that he just ‘enjoys making people smile’. Simply is the wrong word to use, for you can sometimes forget the value of an actual smile. A smile is sometimes priceless. No one knows this better than one mother who was at a Parent Support Group event where Dan was helping; to her amazement Dan was able to make her child to smile. This excited the mother, for she had not seen her child smile in over two years. I could work at Freshwinds for another five or even fifty years and I don’t think I would achieve something so indescribably important.

Dan is very modest and he feels like Freshwinds has helped him more than he has helped the charity. I beg to differ and in the end we agree to disagree. Whichever one of us is right it is not important, for I know that Dan will continue making us all smile in his next five years with Freshwinds.