AHEAD 2010

Last week found the AHEAD conference in the Mile High City…and with yours truly exhibiting as always! The Assoc. on Higher Education and Disability is composed of disability support services professionals at colleges and universities across the country, plus a variety of other professionals who work in the field with disabilities. And, as always, it was such a great time seeing awesome people!

Special thanks to Jenny Dugger, Rae, Melanie Thompson, Emily, Erin, Lana, Tamara and a whole slew of others who I did NOT get to go to dinner with!

Thanks to all who stopped by our booth and got books, grabbed info and expressed interest in bringing the Marcus message to campus this fall!

They Need Everything

Lsast night, I played an acoustic set with my buddy, C.J. "Pappa Capps" Jurnigan for a chairity event.

Dan, a friend of C.J.'s and now mine, had an interesting experience. As a guy in his mid-20s, he was making good bread, living the life he wanted and was invited to go on a church trip to Honduras to do some missionary work. He'd done mission trips before, but this time, he felt led to a certain area of Honduras. There, he found a group of children living in a village. These kids were all the product of incest, rape and molestation and are outcasts in the community. This is when Dan's mission trip became a mission of his own.

He's made it his mission to help these children by teaching them to help themselves. In addition to helping feed and clothe them, he's also teaching them the responsibility of community. They're shown every day that they CAN play a part in their own development and their community by picking up litter off the beach.

Dan has just achieved 501C3 status for his organization, and last night's event was the first fund/awareness raiser he's had. The org is so new, in fact, that their web site isn't yet fully developed. Please stay tuned to EE for updates on Dan's progress and for opprotunities to help out the less fortunate of Central America.

Running Their Own Race

Over the weekend, I got caught up with my buddy, C.J. He's in a local band with a local celebrity and has really been getting some attention in the Orlando area. When we talked, I congratulated him on all the gigs he's been getting lately and the publicity the band has received.

"Yeah, it probably looks good from the outside," he said, "But the inside baseball scoop is that it's crumbling quick. The lead singer isn't E mailing the rest of the band the set lists, half the time we get on stage we haven't even practiced the songs he's picked out. And then there are just the egos; a lot of infighting andit starts to feel like I'm the supervisor of an adult day care."

I let him vent because, hey, that's what friends do. And really, a lot of it just sounds like rock-n-roll!

The next day, I saw his post on Facebook. Apparently, he had some time to simmer down because this was his status:

"I've come to realize all the crap I presume from other people isn't necessarily what I think. Everyone is just busy trying to run their own race. So am I."

When I take some time to marinate on this, it gets even more clear. When I get frustrated at others for the way they act, talk, etc., I've been trying to take a step back and be Zen. They're just running their race the only way they know how. I am, too.