By Doug Gablinske

President, AppraiseRI

I have been a member of the Bristol Rotary for almost 30 years and made many friends and contacts through those years.  I have not always been faithful in my time to Rotary but always came back to it. Rotary is a Happy Place for me!

I like what we do and how we do it. We meet every other week for lunch at a local restaurant and you get to break bread and converse with people you may not see often, or new members joining the club. The President runs the meeting, which is short on oratory, but long on where our ongoing and ever new projects are at. We constantly run events to raise money to give away. We have a Board of Directors that meets once a month to deal with the to whom and how much of the money goes and how it goes.

Rotary is a worldwide organization. When I first joined Rotary, it was an all men’s organization, soon after I was a member, that by-law thankfully changed.  Since then, we have had many GREAT females, as Presidents. We have had many a great leader of the club who chartered the club through good and bad times.

The Town of Bristol is a unique municipality. Pride in the town, it’s history, it’s people, it’s culture and it’s volunteerism are hallmarks of its character.

Each week we hear from a chosen speaker, mostly from local organizations, others are state organizations, some represent national or international groups. The common thread among them is they do good in their own sphere of influence and there are many spheres out there doing good for our neighbors, friends, the less fortunate and humanity.

Here are some of the organizations we help, East Bay Food Pantry, RI Veterans Home, Girls Orphanage in San Miguel, Portugal, The Autism Project, Women’s Resource Center, Polio Plus. The list is long and always growing to meet the demand.

The Rotary logo is wheel with spokes. To me, it means each Rotarian puts their shoulder to that wheel to make it turn for our community, our region, our country, and the world into a better place. Some Rotarians fall off the wheel, others come aboard, but the wheel keeps turning!

While I have been a Rotarian for nearly 30 years, I have not always been active. But the guiding principles of Rotary to do good and help others always pulled me back into the fold.

I have been a leader in many parts of my personal political and business life, often acceding to the highest position of leadership. In Rotary, I decided decades ago I wanted to be an Indian and not a chief. I wanted to be a mid-level doer, an organizer of events. I started a yearly food drive and ran the waterfront festivals for many years, as well as did little things that needed to get done and be done.

As a RIMBA member, if you are looking for a way to give back to your community, meet good people and feel good about yourself and others, I urge you to become a Rotarian, you won’t regret it. The Rotary motto is “Service Above Self”, believe in it and maybe it will become your “Happy Place” too!