Charles Dickens said it best, that no one’s life is useless, or unimportant, when they work toward helping others. Those who know me can vigorously attest that helping others is part of my life work. I’ve been volunteering for various non-profit groups since I was in elementary school, thanks to my 4-H program. That lesson of loving others through doing what we can for them stuck, and now as a forty-something adult I continue the effort that elementary school me started.
She is smart as a whip, and knows to temper her sass with a smile. She’s gorgeous.
The sweet girl above is my godchild. She’s all kinds of amazing. As you can imagine, she is a blazing ball of energy, dancing her way through life. She has no idea that she’s poor. She doesn’t understand that her mother struggles to pay the bills. She definitely does not understand that her mother does without needed things in favor of buying school clothes, or, more simply, food and gasoline.
She’s seen life’s highs and lows, and she’s more beautiful inside and out because of it.
The picture above is of my beloved godchild’s mama, Kela. Our friendship started out as party girls, when we were both single, childless and had way too much time on our hands to seek out excitement, thrills, heartache and finally, stability. Kela works extremely hard to give my godchild the life she deserves, one filled with love, laughter, and the support of her family. She works several jobs to support herself and her daughter, as many single mothers do. Fiercely independent, Kela has learned how to lean on friends and family when the burden is too heavy.
Kela has the misfortune of having a faulty body. A lemon. If her body was a car, I’d have recommended returning it to the dealer immediately. At the age of 22 she was diagnosed with an abnormality in her hip that caused knee issues, resulting in not one, but two arthroscopic surgeries. At 30, her orthopaedist told her she would need a hip replacement, and although at the time it seemed unreal, she learned how true the words were. Now at age 37 she can’t hold off any longer. In the last year alone, the pain has increased to be a continual torture, and walking with a limp has deteriorated into limping with a cane. She needs to have the hip replacement surgery, or end up in a wheelchair. The problem is that she can’t afford the $1500 out of pocket expense.
At the urging of her friends, Kela has set up a fundraising site. As I write this, we’ve raised a third of the money she needs to have by November 19th, to pay the surgeon and have the procedure done as scheduled. I’m asking for you to consider giving. I’m asking that you think long and hard about how you’d feel if this was one of your loved ones, your friend. And I’m hoping that not only do we raise the remaining thousand dollars in time, that we exceed that amount so that Kela can pay the bills that will come afterward, for anesthesia, physical therapy, and the costs incurred during her recovery at home, unable to work. She’s hoping to be approved for an office pool of sick/vacation hours, but right now is assured of only one week of paid time off, as that’s all she’s earned at the job she started this year.
Can you please donate, or share this so that someone else may give? I want to see my godchild dancing with her mother. I want to see them chase each other, both giggling, as they enjoy a sunny afternoon. I want to know that we didn’t fail as a circle of support, and that one mother finally receives what she needs. Even a small amount of money will help, if you can give a little.
“It’s bad enough in life to do without something YOU want; but confound it, what gets my goat is not being able to give somebody something you want THEM to have.”~ Truman Capote, A Christmas Memory
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