I had a recent conversation with LaDonna Snow from Clovis’ Snowflake Designs. It reinforced a business conviction I have long held: If you're going to do business today in this climate, you're going to have to be flexible.
Bethany Byrd started 5 Stones Open Door after seeing five of her friends die as a result of abuse. That abuse took several forms over the years, each of which is addressed by the non-profit organization she founded several years ago. They became the five stones of an outreach to people whose lives have been touched by domestic violence, sexual assault, and human trafficking.
Sally has an idea for a non-profit to help urban youth navigate the challenges of 21st century life. John has a dream of opening a restaurant to feature the food that generations of family members from his homeland prepared. Marcos has a talent to share with the world. Henrietta needs to expand her existing business and market her products in the light of new realities of worldwide pandemics and new opportunities on the internet. Jackson wants to use Zoom more effectively in his consulting business.
A few weeks ago, I was working at Fresno's Woodward Park branch library, but I arrived too early and it was not open. Simultaneously, I had a "hankering" for coffee. I crossed the street to the shopping center knowing that any respectable center of its kind would have, at least, a mediocre cup of coffee.
It started with one man's love of "*boujie" foods and grew to embrace a good friend who loved meat and potatoes. Mike Carriosa and his wife, Noel, have long enjoyed the fruits of their gourmand taste buds. Mike's buddy, Joey Abbs, has long loved meat and potatoes. Together, they embarked, over a year ago, on an adventure to discover and review foods that Joey could not spell.
On December 24, Christmas Eve, Jeff Aiello posted these words to his Facebook friends: “Christmas Eve marks the official end of the Creek Fire.”
It was a great Christmas gift after four months of High Sierra burning.
I know it is a very unusual and challenging year and it has the potential to suck the life out of the holidays. However, it can also be an occasion for making them more special than ever.
Let me start with this. Many things have been closed that have never been closed before:
Doctor's offices.
Stores and restaurants. Beauty Salons and barbers.
Recently, I became aware of the Fourteen Holy Helpers. I was thinking about the lesson that Fred Rogers would teach children about how to cope with profound crisis. He said to look for the helpers because there were always helpers. Sometimes they we teachers, sometimes police officers or doctors and nurses. Sometimes they were neighbors, but there were always going to be helpers and the helpers would help.
Things were as they had been for a long time. Nothing much changed. Relationships were well defined. Alliances were set. Positions were clear. Lines were drawn in indelible ink. It was comfortable.
