A few years ago, Adina Lichtman was handing out sandwiches on the streets of New York City to help people experiencing homelessness. One man, grateful for the sandwich, approached her and offered a surprising idea.

“It’s great that you’re giving out sandwiches,” he said, “but one thing we really need is socks, especially as winter approaches.”

“Here I was, sandwiches in hand, thinking I knew the best way to help people,” Lichtman said. “It was a powerful lesson, and I wanted to put it into action.”

She began that night, with a simple step: going door-to-door on the floor of her dormitory at New York University, asking her classmates if they could each just donate (捐赠) just one pair of their own socks to someone experiencing homelessness. She got 40 pairs of socks in a single night, from a single floor. The next morning she opened her door to find a lot of socks that other people had donated.

That morning officially kicked off Knock Knock, Give a Sock (KKGS), a new nonprofit (非营利的) organization that has now provided over 350,000 pairs of socks to the homeless across America. To date, over 50 colleges and high schools across the US have joined KKGS over the years.

“While many people donate clothing, 9 out of every 10 clothing donors have never donated socks. On top of that, people who are trying to donate socks often find it difficult to donate used socks,” she says. “KKGS is one of the only organizations that collects used socks. We have volunteers knocking on doors of their classmates in school, of their workmates at work, and even of their neighbors.”

But, whether you’re 26 or 62, you don’t need to wait to organize your own sock drive, collect socks, or even wash and clean some of your own to donate to your local shelter, or someone in need who you meet on the street.

Recently, as I watched my son Nathan play basketball for his high school team, I   was starting to feel sorry for myself and for him. His team was facing adversity (逆境) on the court and he was playing in a hostile environment---it was the opponent's home gym filled with their supporters, and Nathan's team was trailing (落后) for three quarters of the game. As for me, I had been dismissed from my job earlier in the day.

During my drive home, I kept telling myself that I will find work again in a short time----I am confident in my experience and abilities. This is the same belief that I tried to instill in my son.

The basketball game entered the fourth quarter with Nathan' S team still trailing. I saw the determination on his, as well as his teammates' faces as they fought back to not only tie the game (平局), but then go ahead by three points. Then, a player from the other team made an unbelievable shot to tie the game up again. With a tie game and seconds on the clock, Nathan found himself with the ball and with skill and confidence, he proceeded                    to make the basket with a defender hanging all over him. The other player was called for a foul (犯规).

As Nathan stood at the foul line preparing for a shot that would put his team up by three points, I saw the focus and determination on his face, there was no room for self doubt. Nathan was able to tune out all the distractions and nail the free throw with such skill, it was as if he had done it a thousand times.

As I sat there, my heart bursting with pride, it dawned on me. I had taught him perseverance in the face of adversity, and he had just taught me the same lesson. That brief moment of self-doubt and feeling sorry for myself was blown away by the actions of my son on the basketball court. He will play in the finals, but it doesn't matter if he wins or loses, at this moment, we both won.

My kids sit in Gee’s living room and lift Christmas ornaments (装饰物) out of a box. Gee stands beside them, explaining each treasure. She tells me that she and Tom built their ornament collection during each year’s after-Christmas sale. She smiles as we leave with the box.

We first met Tom and Gee in the early days of our marriage. Someone had been handling our garbage cans to the garage each garbage day, and Jim and I had wondered who. One day we spotted him: an elderly man who lived across the street.

I left some cookies and left them on a bench outside the garage with a thank-you note. When we got home from work that day, a typed letter had replaced the gift. The letter was from Tom and he explained how he had come to walk the neighborhood on garbage day, returning cans for people. Back when he’d been fighting a war, his young wife, Gee, had found herself living alone. Neighbors had taken the time to handle her garbage cans, so she didn’t have to, and he never forgot. Now he paid it forward by doing the same for all of us.

A few years after we’d moved in, Tom died. We photocopied that letter and attached it to one of our own for Gee. We told her how special Tom had been to us. She wrote back and told us she still talked to Tom every day and invited us to look through Christmas ornaments, I realized how had it must be to part with that box.

These days, we’re planning a move, but Jim and I agree to wait until January. This Christmas, we’ll decorate our tree with Gee’s ornaments. Maybe I’ll talk to him just as Gee still does. Thank you, I’ll say. For teaching us what it means to be a neighbor.