08/03/2026
The Wandering Eye
Chapter 26: The Number That Never Matters
Every year, I make the same mistake.
I tell everyone the goal... not the large one, but the small ones that matter to only me.
Seven hundred backpacks.
Eight hundred backpacks.
A dollar amount.
A deadline.
A finish line.
Then I spend weeks wondering if we are going to fail. If I am going to fail, me, not you all.
This year has been no different.
As I write this, we have secured 822 backpacks to children who need them this year. We have invested $17,612.00 in total this time around, into school supplies, backpacks, and everything it takes to make this happen annually.
In eleven years, together, we have now given away more than 5,000 backpacks.... That is almost $150,000.00 overall.
If everything comes together the way we hope, this year's event could push us beyond 6,000 children.
..and yet?
I still wonder if we missed the goal.
Funny, isn't it?
How can someone stand in front of hundreds of backpacks and still wonder whether they failed?
Because that's what goals do.
They are strange little things.
Goals are not destinations.
They are magnets.
They pull you somewhere you probably never would have gone without them.
Imagine if, eleven years ago, I had simply said,
"Let's just help a few kids."
Would we be here today?
Would five thousand children have walked into school carrying something that told them, "Someone believes in you."
Probably not.
Instead, every year we picked a number.
Sometimes it felt impossible. Starting off it was only 150 backpacks. Then it grew... year after year.
Sometimes we looked foolish announcing it.
Sometimes we were behind until the very last week.
One year, we made our goal the nigh before we handed out backpacks. Putting all of this on a credit card hoping the risk would pay off... and it always did.
Sometimes the donations poured in at the last minute, like that.
Sometimes they didn't..
Every year felt different.
Every year felt uncertain.
Yet every single year...
People showed up!
That's the part we forget when we talk about goals.
The goal isn't just the number. It is not only a statistic.
The number is simply permission to dream loudly enough that other people hear it. Its what you can brag about when the time comes.
People often ask me,
"Did you hit your goal?"
I don't think that's the right question anymore.
The better question is...
"Who became part of the story because there was a goal?"
" What positive connections did we make this year?"
"Who did we impact that we have not before?"
Because somewhere, someone bought one backpack with their $20 donation.
Someone else sponsored twenty...
A child donated birthday money while Tie Dying with us at Lilac Family Fun Fest.
A local business emptied a jar of spare change, crayon donations, and opened up their doors to our supply donations.
Volunteers gave up work hours.
School board members, principals, and more carried boxes and stuffed hundreds of backpacks with us..
Families with small kids sorted pencils, pens, etc.
Children helped other children.
None of those moments happen without something to rally around...
The goal wasn't just eight hundred backpacks.
The goal was always to create a reason for hundreds of people to believe they could make Rochester just a little bit kinder.
That's success.
One final thing...
I've learned something else over the years.
The finish line always moves.
When we gave away one hundred backpacks, I wanted two hundred.
When we reached five hundred, I dreamed about one thousand.
When we crossed five thousand lives impacted, my mind immediately wondered...
"Could we someday reach ten thousand?"
Human beings are wired that way.
Psychologists call it the hedonic treadmill, or our tendency to quickly adapt to achievements and immediately look toward the next milestone.
It's why promotions lose their excitement.
It's why new cars eventually become old cars.
It's why reaching a goal often feels strangely... ordinary.
If we aren't careful, we spend so much time chasing the next mountain that we never turn around to appreciate how incredible the view has become. Appreciate what you have now.
Maybe that's the lesson I needed this year.
Not to stop setting goals.
Never stop setting goals.
Set goals so ambitious they make your stomach hurt a little.
Set goals that require other people.
Set goals that make your community stronger.
But don't let a number decide whether your work mattered.
Eight hundred twenty-two backpacks don't define success.
One child walking into school with confidence...
That's success.
One volunteer discovering they love giving back...
That's success.
One business deciding to help again next year...
That's success.
One parent crying because someone cared enough to help...
That's success.
Those victories never fit neatly into a spreadsheet.
One day, these backpack drives will be taken over by someone new...
Someone else will organize them.
Someone else will carry the boxes.
Someone else will count the supplies.
I hope they keep setting goals.
I hope they keep missing them sometimes.
I hope they keep exceeding them other times.
Because that's what meaningful work looks like.
Where will you go?
(603) 973-0812
