On Thursday, my younger sister Lynne and some other moms held a fundraiser for a breakfast program at the high school my neice is going to. Let me back up a second. I have been involved with fundraising for various causes for over 10 years...Breast Cancer awareness, children's breakfast programs, The Hospital for Sick Children to name a few. The tragically unfortunate thing is that if there are "too many" fundraisers or causes requiring money (walks, runs, etc) then the public in general, gets something called "Charity Fatigue". It makes sense since we are bombarded on a daily basis with requests such as these and if you have any empathy whatsoever, your heart will bleed; if in a position (or not) you will open up your purses and wallets. The tragic thing is there are those unscrupulous souls out there in the world that know this and will take advantage. Take for instance the syndicate contacting seniors representing themselves as one of the grandkids in trouble and "could they wire money to them?" This of course is not a charity, but you can see where people can become jaded and wary.
So, back to my sister's fundraiser. It was SO grassroots, and so lovely, I can't begin to tell you. Lynne indicated there were some background politics of which you will always get when there are either egos or money involved, but for your $10 admission, you got a spaghetti dinner, salad, desert and beverages, you got a terrific, award winning school jazz band, auctions for hockey tickets, etc. plus silent auctions and some very creative games that worked very well for the fundraiser. Because I had secured some donations for Lynne, she had placed a ticket for me at the front door. Lovely. The evening looked like it went off without a hitch. I hope they did well.
On another note, my friend from NYC Jeffrey was part of a fundraiser for a friend of his in Buffalo, NY. She had 4th stage breast cancer and was a single mom of two young girls. Their fundraiser was to offset the very expensive chemotherapy (as we know, in the U.S. most health care is not yet covered) It was very successful however he let me know this morning that Karma had passed away. Even though I had not met her and only met Jeffrey last year, we are deeply connected as human beings and anything we can do to help others is why we are put on this earth. If we are not in a position to part with our money, then part with our time donation, or our unused clothes and furnishings....anything.
The only thing enduring we really have in this world is Love.
Cheryl Bower
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