Volunteers are Ageless

NADIA BEN-YOUSSEF Writes poetry and sings for the elderly

Student, Age 13

Sydney, Montana

I've been singing and performing poetry since I was six years old. I guess

I've volunteered since I was eight. My singing is a cappella; I don't sing

with music. My singing and poetry are the same thing. I used to sing for my

mother's friends, and then I started singing for fund-raisers put on by church

groups, women's clubs, the Lions Club, and stuff like that.
I have three books of poetry and songs. A fourth is in production.

I donate all of the money from the books to children's charities. Money

from my first book went to a school for deaf and blind kids in

Great Falls, Montana, and to the Lions Club.

They did a campaign called Sight First to help the blind.

Money from the second book went to Home on the Range,

a shelter for abused children and to the Feed The Children

fund for orphans in Bosnia. I visit people at a local nursing home.

I do the women's hair, I do their nails, and they ask me to come by on

Sundays and perform for them. And I do. There's no microphone

and no musical accompaniment. I also sing for homebound hospice patients.

I visit them and talk and sing for them. I guess that's what's really

fulfilling to me, when I sing to someone who is dying,

someone who is really sick, and who isn't aware of much

of what's happening, but when I'm done there's a smile

on that person's face. I find that everyone needs love, everyone

can give love, and that love is what everyone wants.

That's a really important lesson to me.

Making someone happy makes you happy, and they go on

and make others happy and it's like a chain. Love is a chain of giving.

You change when you get older, but love is ageless.

Love is the same when you are 7, 13, or 102.