[COVER STORY]
Melanie
Hillelsohn
People First
by Eric Johnson
Berlin added a colorful splash to Melanie’s tour of Europe.
Rocky trails. Rugged mountains. An Alaska wilderness adventure with a teenage girl in poor health riding on her back.
That was one of many dramatic scenes last summer displaying the magnitude of Melanie Hillelsohn’s commitment to a lifestyle centered on doing for others — a lifestyle rooted in the community spirit of her people-first hometown, Chantilly.
Melanie literally carried that too-sick-to-walk teenager on a trail in the Denali National Park. It was a selfless task she readily accepted while leading 30-plus high schoolers on a tour of the Pacific Northwest, Alaska, and Hawaii for a youth travel organization.
“She was appreciative of my efforts and light to carry,” Melanie explained in a recent interview. “It was totally fine.”
And totally in character for a woman who was a proud walker to elementary school as a girl, collected toys and wrote cards for hospitalized children as a teenager, worked to emulate her community-minded parents, and graduated from Chantilly High School.
Later while attending Virginia Tech, Melanie balanced college studies with public service. She contributed to several organizations and says she got the most fulfillment by baking bread with friends biweekly for a campus branch of the hunger-fighting charity Nazun. Volunteer participation in the bread-baking extravaganza shot up after Melanie became the social media recruitment chief.
“I have always been interested in public service,” she said. “It’s something I am very passionate about.”
The soil for Melanie’s passion was and still is Chantilly. She lives with her parents David and Melissa Hillelsohn (Virginia natives who hail from Reston and Richmond, respectively) as the oldest of two children.
Melanie works for the nonprofit homebuilding organization Habitat for Humanity as a resource development specialist, commuting about eight minutes to work every day. Her job involves acquiring resources and
establishing partnerships with area businesses, thus opening doors forfundraising for the Habitat cause through sales of donated items in NOVA ReStores, including a ReStore in Chantilly.
The family’ s home is on a cul-de-sac with a cluster of neighbors who truly enjoy one another’s company. So close are these families that about 18 households gather several times a year for outdoor barbecues and even a Thanksgiving turkey fry.
“Everyone signs up for a time slot, and then all the neighbors hang out in the street, drink their holiday beverage of choice, and wait for their turn to fry a turkey,” Melanie explained, adding that every December, the neighborhood’s women bake cookies for a giant cookie exchange party. “There’s an enormous sense of togetherness.”
Many neighbors have known Melanie as a popular babysitter since her first certification in a childcare and safety training course at age 13. For the last nine years, she has cared for children down
Melonie enjoyed spectacular views in England’s Lake District.
the street and across the county while working summers as acamp counselor at various sleepaway and day camp programs.
The neighbors are familiar with the two dogs — each one a rescue animal — that make sure there’s never a dull moment at Melanie’s house.
Tito is an eight-year-old Chihuahua mix. Melanie describes him as “spunky,” but quickly adds that “he’s a couch potato princess. He likes to sit with everyone and bury under the blanket.”
Mike is a silver Labrador who joined the family in 2020 after he was found languishing in a shed where he’d been illegally locked up for breeding. “People stop us all the time and talk about how pretty he is,” Melanie said. “If they only knew how crazy he is,” having survived the shed experience. “Although he’s definitely settled down, he’s still a
rambunctious puppy. He’s a fun goofball.”
Beyond Chantilly, Melanie has discovered many friendly people in Europe who appreciated her people-first perspective. After college graduation in 2022, she worked in three restaurants as a server, building a community as well as funds to embark across the Atlantic to experience the world. She backpacked across the continent, visiting 16 countries and 53 cities.
Two friends traveled to Europe with Melanie, both passionately helping with the hundreds of hours she dedicated to planning the 4.5-month journey. Highlights included fulfilling her late grandmother’s dream going to a Holland tulip festival in the Netherlands, taking an art tour that included the Berlin Wall in the German capital, seeing glassblowing artisans at work in Murano, Italy, and enjoying a spectacular view from a high castle wall in southern Spain.
An airline employee strike shortened her stay in Greece, but it gave her an extra day in Rome to experience the panoramic city view from Castel Sant’Angelo, a visit to the Trevi Fountain for a fourth and final time, and other sites. “The strike was a blessing in disguise,” she said. “We had been moving nonstop our entire stay in Italy, and it was necessary to slow down and appreciate being present halfway through this crazy 134- day journey.”
And a two-day stay at a hostel in England’s scenic Lake District made a unique impression on Melanie and her friends: They arrived at lambing time. “It was a perfect day,” she said. “We literally watched lambs learning to walk mere hours after being born. It was so life changing. I loved it.”
Those little lambs in the English countryside
Mom, Dad, little brother and Melanie
Family pets Tito, foreground, and Mike on a ride
affected Melanie just as she has — and continues to — touch the hearts of others.
Helping carry that girl on a Denali trail was just one of many ways she, alongside her co-counselors, supported dozens of teenagers from New Jersey, New York, and Florida during the Pacific Northwest tour last summer. At other times, she’s helped build homes for people in South Carolina whose dwellings were damaged by a hurricane. She’s also worked for nonprofit and advocacy groups such as Repair the World, which focuses on racial justice, and Bamboo Nordic, which advocated the use of bamboo as a renewable resource.
In addition to her job with Habitat, Melanie works a few hours a week as a volunteer for the 988 mental health and suicide prevention hotline, having been trained to help people facing depression, domestic violence, and other crises.
It’s not always easy to be an emotional pillar of support, Melanie said. “Sometimes I need to remove myself from direct contact with people, so by volunteering for the crisis hotline for four hours a week, I can give back without having to take that all with me at the end of the day.”
Chantilly has given Melanie a lot, and today she is giving back to the community. It’s her passion. And she welcomes others to follow her example by putting people first.
“Doing things like volunteering in your community, or shopping with intention at Habitat for Humanity ReStores, can make a huge impact in the world,” she said. “Every small action can make a difference in someone’s life.”