I drove to Ottawa, KS late morning to go to a Celebration of Life lunch. The weather was amazing for the middle of July. The event was held in a park under a shelter. The family brought fans and they kept up nice and cool. There was plenty of food and lots of folks visiting.
I was lucky and there was a dear friend there that I could visit with. I didn’t know many other people there so was grateful this friend was there. We had a lovely time catching up with each other.
I managed to get rid of most of the cookies I took. Before I left I bagged up several bags of them and gave them away. Now I won’t be tempted to eat so many.
Have spent some time this afternoon going through the post on Facebook and answering questions and comments. It is interesting to read other peoples reaction and their point of view. Amazing how others take things so differently.
While I was gone today a friend dropped by a financial contribution to add to the growing Venmo balance and another couple came over with some cards and stamps. I so appreciated their contributions and support. I have yet other donations to pick up next time I am in Emporia.
Monday I want to schedule a face-to-face with the director of the detention center. I need to prepare him for the response to my post and brainstorm a bit to see if there are more ways we can support the detainees.
Monday I am also going to attempt to contact the immigration attorney I met when I protested at the center back in April. I want to see if he has ideas of ways we can best support the detainees.
I need to find a few people that will help me form an advisory council of sorts for this project. I don’t want all the responsibility of this on my own. The funds are starting to add up and it needs several heads working together to best use this new resource to its maximum potential. I said I needed a project – guess what, I found one! This one is going to take some time to successfully implement and manage.
Tomorrow is a stay-at-home day for me. I have some things I need to work on for this detention center project. I need to figure out a way to thank the people that have sent donations and am not sure how to find their information to do so. I also need some quiet time to think of other ways to put these funds to good use.
This little idea is taking on a life of its own. I have far surpassed what I thought might happen. Grateful others are willing to get involved and help make the plight of the detainees a bit easier. Trusting that we can come up with more ideas of things we can do to help them out.
And yet the bigger issue of the day remains. How does one wrap one’s head around it all and still have the energy to act in love? Guess the old adage of how do you eat an elephant applies – one bite at a time. Doing something is better than doing nothing.
Sitting with a grateful heart from the response that has already come in. Also feeling the weight of the responsibility that comes with it. Seeing so many parallels in this project that is stirring up the bigger issues confronting all of us. How do we handle conflict? How does one stay above neutral and strive for radical love? So many people are carrying so much pain and anger and don’t know what to do with it. How can we do a better job of listening and caring for each other?
Grateful for the generosity that is being shown, grateful for friends and family that attended the Celebration of Life today, and grateful I don’t have to have the answers to life’s bigger problems.