And Away-y-y-y-y-y They Roll

Our intrepid walkers, Tara & John-Michael, arrived on the eastern edge of Bexley around 5pm Saturday, April 20. Sharon dismissed herself from her phone volunteer duties at the WCBE 90.5 FM Spring On-Air Fund Drive to drive to Johnson’s Real Ice Cream on East Main Street and walk with the cross-country hikers the remaining mile-and-a-half to our house, where Jim joined them after a semi-successful on-air pitch session with Dan Mushalko during PRAIRIE HOME COMPANION.

Our guests were so appreciative of the creature comforts they rarely enjoyed since leaving the Atlantic shore- a night’s sleep, on matresses, in a warm, dry house after a home-cooked supper. They would enjoy a day of stand-down in our town as they visited another friend locally, then Monday proceed on toward the Pacific coast in Oregon, rolling west on Broad Street, US Route 40, the National Road. You can now follow them HERE,and on their FACEBOOK.

Who Wants To Live In An Intentional Community?

There is so much appeal for me for the notion of an intentional community. One benefit that I specifically like is the economy-of-scale opportunities for all participants.

How do we FIND SUCH A COMMUNITY? Well, this primer is a start.

Here Tonight- 1/4 of Their Way Walking Across America

Here’s a follow-up from my post of April 12. Yesterday John-Michael phoned me from their west-bound trek along US Route 40 in Licking County. They planned on camping Friday night in Hebron, Ohio, and would arrive at Chez Coe in Bexley Saturday evening.
Sharon & I plan on giving them a comfy C-bus welcome…a great pizza,
showers or baths, a warm, dry bed and an opportunity to launder their hiking duds.

Any friends of this blog nearby, connect with me and we’ll have you over to mingle with the walkers. They are about 25% of their way to the Oregon coast, each mile with their feet on the ground.
Follow their daily progress on their blog here,WeWalkAndRoll, and also on their Facebook.

Meet Tara and John-Michael…They are walking across America.

Sharon, Rachael and I recently rented a Toyota and drove to New Jersey to attend a family bat mitzvah. Terrific event- Maya the bat mitzvah was in command of her entire weekend and family gathered from Israel, Florida, New York, Philadelphia, Columbus, Buffalo and Chicago.
We spent the nights at a Route 1 hotel in suburban Jersey near New Brunswick, home of Rutgers University. Endless miles of strip malls and big boxes, this could have been near any top 50 metropolis in US, it’s all the same.

But WAIT…look who just walked, and ROLLED, up…Tara and her husband John-Michael.

This couple, bundled up outside the Staybridge Inn lobby (it was a sleety-damp windsome day in the high 30s) certainly didn’t resemble just any man & woman grazing the array of restaurants along American thoroughfares. First of all, they didn’t drive up to the hotel, they WALKED. Not from their parked car, but from a corner of New Jersey from where ocean-going vessels launch, Perth Amboy, that underarm of the state where the Atlantic reaches inland in the form of Raritan Bay. Tara and John-Michael has just completed their first day of a walk across the United States, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, pledging to walk every step…no train, no bus, no taxi, no tractor-wagon…hoofin’ every mile to the Oregon coast and rolling their household necessities along, as illustrated…

They didn’t appear worse for the wear-&-tear of a 20 mile hike in less-than-pleasant weather wheeling their carts along the highway shoulders…no sidewalks in stripmall-land. And 20-miles is the daily unit they intend to travel, often camping outdoors.
Today they appear to be approaching Washington, PA, walking west on US Route 40, the paved pre-interstate path paralleling the 40th latitude.
You can follow their trek on their blog, WeWalkandRoll

When we met them we learned that they will stay on US 40 at least to Terre Haute, IN, their hometown, and they confirmed that they will be rolling through Columbus, at which time we insisted they stop at the Coe estate to dine, clean up and rest…perhaps even do laundry. Afterall, we live less than two miles from where they will pass through central Ohio on the National Road. At their current progress, we expect to host April 18. We’ll keep you informed. In the meantime, LIKE them on Facebook.

Is Blog Dead?

I heard Bruce Sterling‘s keynote address from this month’s SXSW conference, “DISRUPTION & DESTRUCTION,” and it got me to consider the ephemeralness of us all.  He speculates that blogs will pass into the past in terms of significance, as did the pc, as did the “stone boxes,” the cliff-hugging adobe abodes of an indigenous people of 1100 AD in what is now southwestern US.

So, I’m wondering, IS BLOG DEAD?  I read this and reminisce of the infamous TIME cover circa Easter, 1966, to wit…IS GOD DEAD? Provocative, eh? And historical, as it was TIME’s first cover without a photo, simply red text on a black field, with all focus on the 3 words posed as question.

Let’s be candid…blogging, my blog posts, your blog posts, they’re all masturbatory.  We’re playing with ourselves, and if we’re deserving, we have voyeurs partnering, anticipating the climax, readers bearing witness. But let’s not neglect perspective.  Which bloggers do you read whose work  compares with Shakespeare?

I blog because I want to stay in the game, just as I stand on stage and sing poorly into the mic, just as I act in local theater, just as I deliver an address to an audience in public.  Who knows, in any one of these endeavors I might stimulate someone with a seed, a thought, an epiphany.

Finally, if in fact staying on the playing field is the motivating factor, then it’s continuous training, for if I don’t blog then what few communicative skills I possess I forfeit…it’s USE IT OR LOSE IT and in most activities that rhymes true.

Why do you blog?

A story about holding hands

 

Do you find that many of our most eventful memories in life are in story-form? Maybe from childhood with a family member reading/telling your bedtime story, or a warm remembrance of an occasion that you and friends constantly re-tell at get-togethers?

 

We in Columbus shared a marvelous story recently, many times over, as told by Joel Diaz, who recently was verbally attacked while waiting in line for pizza by a bullying bigot.  To Joel’s defense came everyone else in the line, including the pizza stand staffers at Mikey’s Late Night Slice who ejected the offender with their refusal to serve to a hate-spewing homophobe who objected to his observation of…

two men holding hands!

 

Joel posted his story on his Facebook page, and the “likes” and “shares” comments truly went viral. Once HuffingtonPost picked it up Joel’s original post had been shared by over 900 other Facebook users.

Here is a mainstream media account from the New York Daily News,

and here is HuffingtonPost‘s.

 

So, the take-away of this story for me, and possibly for you, is that those of us who call Columbus home can be proud and inspired that we’re moving closer to the tipping point to reduce hatred and bigotry in our town.  When you hear of acts such as this, do you feel uplifted with hope?

 

This works for me!

 

And here at Columbus’ NPR broadcaster, WCBE, our story is called…

 

Holding Hands in

Philanthropy.

 

The details are below, but let me jump to the dessert first…

during the final 36 days of 2012, listeners who support 90.5 FM with their dollars as well as their ears made a total of $ 103,499 in donations to WCBE, which in turn leveraged Green B.E.A.N. Delivery to provide over a ton, 2190 pounds of fresh produce to Mid-Ohio Food Bank.

 

For me, this is yet another story that hammers home the generosity and passion of our neighbors in the 614. 

THANK YOU ALL!

 

Last issue I wrote that “Triple-Bottom-Line is s-o-o-o-o 2011“

in a cheeky manner of describing how a business does well by doing good in their practice not merely of commerce, but how they interact within their community.

These businesses place a higher priority on how to influence STAKEHOLDERS than to singularly profit shareholders.

 

Specifically, I described WCBE‘s ongoing partnership with the local business,

Green B.E.A.N. Delivery who for the third year  joined as our  partner and made an in-kind contribution- for each individual listener who made a donation to WCBE, Green B.E.A.N. donated two pounds of fresh produce to the Mid-Ohio Food Bank, which in turn distributes much-demanded food to over 550 food pantries across central and eastern Ohio. All this is leveraged by the philanthropy of individual listeners making th at first step, calling or going online to donate.

 

So, how is the benefit-cycle quadruple?

 

1)  WCBE benefits by receiving listener’s gifts.

2)  The Mid-Ohio Food Bank, and food pantries, benefit by directly

     receiving fresh produce in early-January.

3)  Green B.E.A.N. Delivery benefits with the good will generated by their

     donation of fresh groceries mentioned in broadcasts on Columbus &

     central-Ohio’s NPR station.

4)  Each listener who donates benefits with the knowledge that their gift

    starts the cascade of further gifts in our community.

 

color spectrum haiku

the black flickering

shadow of the red cardinal

dances on white snow