Below, find something I wrote over at Facebook (copied and pasted here) along with a funny childhood memory I wrote about when I was discussing fall festivals.
I think I'll start with the funny story first--and, after reading it, you will be so pulled in that getting you to go on reading the rest of what I've written will be...........pun definitely intended...............a cake walk!
P.S. Speaking of fall festivals and games, let me tell you about something funny that happened when I was in first grade and at a fall festival at my school (Fall Creek Heights Elementary--Go Yellow Jackets!!!)...
We had a fall festival each year in October, and all of the classrooms were turned into places to play carnival games.
The gym became the place to gather to eat, attend a raffle later, and--at least, that particular year--to have a cake walk.
We had a young custodian and bus driver (not my bus--I just knew him from his custodian activities) named John Ent, and I had the biggest crush on him. I mean, it must have been the mother of ALL crushes!
Of course, he was married with a new baby, but--at six years old--that didn't matter to me.
He was around 21 and looked like a cross between Johnny Cash and Elvis--to me, anyway.
Whenever he appeared on the scene, I could hardly focus on what I was doing.
Seeing him even distracted me from eating lunch--which is a miracle! LOL
His wife and baby usually joined him in the lunchroom, but I wasn't jealous or anything like that. I wasn't planning on stealing him away from her. It was just the same kind of crush that I had on Pat Boone, Dick Clark, Robert Stack, etc. Like the person takes my breath away!
Anyway, it was fall festival night, and we were having this cake walk.
For anybody not knowing what a cake walk is, this is when there are squares with numbers on them placed on the floor in a circle, and everybody walks around in a circle while music plays.
When the music stops, the announcer calls out a number, and, if you're standing on it, you get to go pick out a cake.
So, I was in the cake walk circle with my folks (and, if I remember right, my aunt and cousin), and we were walking around to the music.
That is, we were until I noticed John Ent in the circle with his wife, folks, sister, and other family members, and I stopped dead in my tracks and just stood there staring at him with a goofy look on my face.
People were urging me to keep the circle moving, but I was oblivious to them.
My folks finally had to take me out of the circle and put me on the bleachers so that the game could go on!
Fall festivals bring smiles to the faces of children--and Youth Outreach Day
is about bringing smiles to the faces of children, teens, and young
adults who could really use something to smile about!
We don't need another paid holiday--even if there might be some people
who want another one--so getting another paid holiday isn't what this
is all about.
I'm pretty certain that employers think that there are enough paid
holidays hanging around, even if one more (minimum) might thrill
employees to no end.
Therefore, any business owner who might be hesitant to put another
holiday on the calendar due to fearing one more day of paying employees
to stay home and relax can rest assured that this isn't what we're
after.
Invisible Youth Network has created a petition that will be sent to
President Obama after we get at least 1000 signatures on it--and the
more the merrier, so please share what I've written here with your own
network of friends.
Although I'm going to share two direct links to our website with
you--the home page and the page about the proposal for a holiday called
Youth Outreach Day--I want to tell you something about our vision for
YO-Day (That's, of course, a more casual way of saying Youth Outreach
Day that I came up with, as it might look cool on certain things such
as t-shirts--and it just sounds cool and fits into small spaces well).
First off the time:
We want the second Saturday of every October to be officially recognized as Youth Outreach Day.
Now for the definition:
Although we want our young people remembered and cared for 24/7 and
365, this is a special day set aside for a special recognition and
celebration of our young people--and, especially, those who are having
a rough way to go (everything from being taunted/bullied in school,
abused at home, not fitting in due to disabilities and/or poverty,
fill-in-the-blank-here-wit
h-more-options to those who actually have ended up trying to survive out on the streets).
Youth Outreach Day will be a great time to hold yard sales, do thons,
have bake sales/bazaars, wash cars, etc. to raise funds to help out
needy kids in your own communities and/or donate to places such as
Invisible Youth Network.
It's also a time of hands-on celebrating, if you live in an area such
as San Diego, Chicago, Toronto, etc. where there are homeless youth
hanging out. Get with friends to do a cook-out, games, etc. that will
be street-kid-friendly so that they can make some happy childhood/youth
memories and--when these get-togethers get noticed--even end up with
places to live!
It might be a good time to send out e-mails and/or snail-mails to
people in high places informing them of the need--as well as a time for
planning what to do the rest of the year to make certain that our young
people won't be forgotten and left to fall through the cracks of
society.
Without any further ado, here's the link to the homepage of our
website. Please go there at least--and, hopefully, end up exploring the
entire website to try to find a place where you might fit into this
special mission...
http://invisibleyouthnetwork.net
The following is the link to the page where it talks about getting
Youth Outreach Day recognized as a regular holiday--as in even finding
it on calendars from such places as Hallmark and American
Greetings!--and, at the bottom of that page, there's a link that will
take you to the petition...
http://invisibleyouthnetwork.net/EnactYouthOutreachDay.aspx
In the short time we've had our petition up, we have collected (as of
this writing) 29 signatures from not only citizens of the USA but,
also, various other parts of the world!
Remember that number (29) when you go to sign it, because that will
show you where we were on Wednesday, October 21, 2009 at almost ten in
the morning Anderson, Indiana time (which is almost seven in the
morning San Diego, California time). If you go there and see a higher
number (even if it's only a number or so higher), you can celebrate
with us!
And, by signing it, you can make the number get higher as we press on
towards our goal of 1000 signatures minimum to present to President
Obama!!!
Now onto other IYN business when I share a letter written by our
Founder & Chairman, Russell T. Hartsaw. If you're currently a
student, teacher, staff member, etc. at a high school or college,
please noise what he's written around...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hello!
Are you familiar with our organization (Invisible Youth Network), which
was officially launched on March 26, 2007 for the purpose of reaching
out to homeless youth. If not, you might want to become familiar with
us by visiting our main website:
http://invisibleyouthnetwork.net
At this time, we are encourage teens and young adults to work together
with faculty/staff at their high school and college campuses in the
establishment of chapters of the Invisible Youth Network, which will
get your students involved in worthwhile civic activities.
There is no fee to pay for starting a chapter, and we will give you
whatever support you will need to both get started and maintain a
chapter, along with being available to answer any questions you might
have, now and later.
It's been our experience in the past that we can count on our youth to
bring a lot of insight and enthusiasm into our organization, so we're
anxious to hear back from you so that we can get started.
The Invisible Youth Network supports the leaders of tomorrow by partnering with them today!
Teens can bring refreshing insights into our organization. What we
forget is that some of the greatest minds in the world were teens when
they came up with their great ideas.
So, shouldn't youth as young people have a voice in issues that
directly concern them? They will not mysteriously learn how to fulfill
their civic duties the day they turn 18. They are a large presence in
our community and accordingly, they should have a voice in its
decision-making. And, shouldn't adults recognize that the tradition of
making decisions for youth without youth has failed and that their
ideas and solutions need to be taken seriously?
In addition Youth are 28% of the United States population, are active
participants in community activities, spend more than $150 billion a
year and are 100% of the future.
Russell T. Hartsaw
Founder & Chairman
Invisible Youth Network
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Invisible Youth Network is a grass roots project. It began with Russell
and me talking together about starting something like this.
Russell has actually experienced firsthand what it's like to be an
invisible youth after his parents mysteriously disappeared when he was
nine years old and he ended up a ward of the state of Florida.
He has had a long and, too often, painful journey to get to where he is
today and has an unquenchable passion for helping today's invisible
youth to avoid some of the mistakes he has made/things that he has gone
through along the way.
I grew up just the opposite--one of the privileged ones blessed with a
loving, stable family, several good friends, and the feeling of having
a place that I could truly call home. Even if what we do at IYN can't
completely bring about this kind of experience for our young people, we
want them to come as close as possible to being so blessed.
Since those early days back when 2007 was new (Russell and I met online
on January 15, 2007 when we were both writing for a discussion site
called Duno), and he and I talked into the wee hours of the morning
about our dreams, this organization of our dreams was officially named
and launched on March 26, 2007, and, even before then, we had joined up
with so many great people who shared our dream.
Several of you are right here on Facebook with us, and it would be hard
to tag all of you--but feel free to leave your comments here with this
note so that others can get to know you.
We also hope that, if you're reading about IYN for the first time, that you'll end up making it a household word of your own!
Perhaps, there will come a time when IYN is no longer needed, and that
will be a glorious day! Until then--when even one child is at-risk of
fading into invisibility--we would really like to be out there reaching
out to him/her.
Russell and I won't be around forever--and neither will you--so the
torch needs to keep on being passed from one generation to another
until no young person ever again gets left behind for any reason!!!
Blessings!
Ainsley Jo Phillips
Co-Founder
Invisible Youth Network
A few more matters before closing...
The picture used to illustrate this note isn't an original from me but,
instead, one I found on The Internet that I thought would fit the bill
quite well. I would like to share the link to the blog-entry where it
was posted. I don't know if the blogger is the original owner of the
picture, either. It's probably just a stock photo. However, that person
deserves to be credited for having used it before I have...
Home Decor Village News--Family Fall Fun
http://decorvillage.wordpress.com/2007/11/05/family-fall-fun/
Along those same lines, I've been promising a friend (whom I met at
another site, but she's here, too) to let others know about the various
things that she does, so I'm going to close this by introducing you to
Kimberly Lovell...
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=739715785
These are some fan clubs here at Facebook for some of her enterprises...
Whimsy Originals
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=739715785#/pages/Los-Angeles-CA/Whimsy-Originals-Online/91994818588?ref=sgm
Patches' Pet Pals
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=739715785#/pages/Los-Angeles-CA/Patches-Pet-Pals/91529371044
Crash Maps Accident Consulting
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=739715785#/pages/Los-Angeles-CA/Crash-Maps-Consulting/91192027686?ref=sgm
And I couldn't sign off after all of that fanfare without giving two
thumbs-up (because I was only born with two thumbs) to Bickel's Uptown
Cafe, which also has a fan club here. Do drop over there to drool--and,
if you're in the area--drop into the real McCoy to eat!!!
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=739715785#/pages/Anderson-IN/Bickels-Uptown-Cafe/97786413973?ref=ts
I think I've bent your Cyber-ears enough for now! Thanks for hanging with me!
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