By Melanie MacDonald, Canadian Red Cross
It’s easy to see that red is Joy Geizer’s favourite colour. Her winter coat is red. Her car is red. All her Christmas ornaments are red. A disaster management volunteer for seven years, Joy stopped by the Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Red Cross office to talk about her passion for helping others while balancing her life as a full-time working mom in the health industry.
Joy first learned about the Canadian Red Cross as a Girl Guide leader teaching a
Red Cross babysitting course, which she continues to this day. Eventually curiosity got the better of her.
“One day, I was driving by the Red Cross building and I detoured on a whim into the parking lot,” she recalls. Since then, she has participated in numerous local responses assisting evacuees of house and apartment fires. As she speaks, Joy’s eyes well up as she recounts a time arriving to assist a woman who had to flee her home without clothes. “The care that firefighters took, wrapping the lady in a blanket, ensuring her dignity as she climbed down the ladder was remarkable. You realize you can lose everything in a blink of an eye.”
“I always wear pyjamas now when I sleep,” she adds.
Joy’s training at the Red Cross prepared her for the more challenging times as a volunteer. “It helped build my self confidence. I knew I could rely on the team for mentoring when I needed it (and) “I’m always learning.” She’s also become more empathetic from experiences like staffing an emergency shelter that operated for several weeks, exposing her to a whole new level of Red Cross response. “People still have to go to work, even when they are in a shelter.”
Asked what she’s learned about the Red Cross she didn’t know before, Joy says, “The reach. I knew about water safety and disaster management but I didn’t know about all the community support programs too.”
For those considering applying to be a
Red Cross volunteer, Joy emphasizes the importance of wanting to do the work required and being able and ready to respond. “It’s not always easy to climb out of a warm bed at three in the morning, but then I think of the people who ran from theirs leaving everything behind that’s dear to them.”