Mark your calendar for Thursday, May 12 from 5:30 – 8:30 p.m. at the Savannah Station at 601 Cohen Street. Appetizers and the band Soap for social hour on the patio from 5:30 – 6:30. The biggest and best covered dish supper in Chatham Country from 6:30 – 7:30 (bring a covered dish to share). Home Grown Good News: Stories from citizen advocates from 7:30 – 8:30 p.m. Children are welcome!
*Thanks to Andrew Davies of Paragon Design Group for graphic design services!
As part of the Waddie Welcome Martin Luther King Jr. Day Worldwide Read, groups of people have been reading the story together in each other’s homes, churches, community centers and coffee shops. Here is a reflection from a coffee shop reading in Cincinnati.
“I would walk away a changed man…” — Dave Murley
Several weeks ago, April and I attended a book reading at the Coffee Emporium in Cincinnati. We ventured out on Martin Luther King Day to downtown Cincinnati and found this huge establishment crammed full of people wanting….coffee. About 20 of us were there to read out loud a book called Waddie Welcome and the Beloved Community. I stood in line, grabbed a large cup of coffee and dragged a chair over to join the group. Little did I know I would walk away a different person inspired by a man with a disability from Savannah, Georgia.
Waddie (yes that is his name), was an African-American man who was born with cerebral palsy and was taken care of his family until he was 70 years old. When his parents died he was placed in a nursing home. The story is about how a community came together to help Waddie get out of that nursing home and into a real home again. Waddie could only communicate with yes and no answers, but because people took the time to listen to him they discovered that he did not want to be in the nursing home. He wanted to live in a house that had children and he could smell home cooking. This became a reality with the help of dedicated people from the community who acted as advocates for Waddie.
I volunteered to read around Chapter 9 not knowing that I was going to have to read his very long, touching eulogy. Let’s just say it’s a little hard to read while you are crying and sniffing at the same time. This book is so powerful because it shows you the importance of having our kids with disabilities surrounded by a community of people who care and will take the time to help.
We all think about what will happen to our children when we aren’t around any more. If you have the opportunity to attend a reading or read the book yourself, do it! It will give you hope and much to think about. Truly a life changing book.
Norton Melaver passed away last week. The story of his role in the Savannah community was shared on the front and editorial pages of the Savannah Morning News. Both spoke of his business, religious and civic leadership.
I attended Mr. Melaver’s funeral on Sunday and saw many people that are part of “my” Savannah. All three of the Melaver children spoke about their dad and there was plenty to say. Norton was involved in and led dozens of business, civic and religious activities over the decades. Martin Melaver pointed out that the two public accomplishments his father was proudest of were the hiring of African American cashiers at M&M Supermarkets at a time when this was unheard of, and the questioning and rectifying of certain insider business practices at Memorial Hospital roughly 20 years ago.
Both of these actions took gumption. Not everything we do as leaders or as followers requires gumption. It’s just interesting to me that the two things that Norton felt were his most important contributions involved having the gumption to question and challenge the status quo.
On a personal note, the Melavers were early, long standing, generous contributors to Chatham-Savannah Citizen Advocacy. Norton and wife Betty came to a dinner and discussion at my house 20 years ago, when my wife and I lived on Duffy and Waters. Betty sat on the floor. Norton was a little more formal, but very much at home among the broad mix of people.
Also noted… Reverend Bennie Mitchell passed away earlier this week. Tom Barton shares his memory of Rev. Mitchell in his editorial in today’s Savannah Morning News. If you read Tom’s editorial you will see two familiar names, Waddie Welcome and Addie Reeves…
We are excited to host our 33rd Annual Covered Dish Supper and Meeting on Thursday, May 12th at the Savannah Station from 5:30 – 8:30 p.m. More details to follow. Save the date and join us for great food, music and stories from citizen advocacy matches in Savannah.
Two quick quotes – one next to the other in this Sunday’s New York Times to remind us of just how differently people see what is “right.”
“I was making a crazy amount of money and not even pitching. Honestly, I didn’t feel like I deserved it.” from Gil Meche, an injured pitcher for the Kansas City Royals who gave up his 12 million dollar guaranteed contract for 2011 and retired. Is this man a hero, simply honest, or a chump?
“The greatest tragedy would be to accept the refrain that no one could have seen this coming and thus nothing could have been done.” from a report by a Federal panel concluding that the financial crisis was an avoidable disaster caused by widespread failures in government regulation, corporate management and heedless risk taking by Wall Street. The words regulation, management and taking could be regulators, managers and takers. It was people – not papers – that acted. Some of the “smartest” men and women in the world were seemingly not able to see what was RIGHT – no pun intended – in front on them, created by their own actions and inactions…
Sometimes “everybody” is really nobody. Sometimes one person’s actions can ignite the moral imagination of a nation, a town, an organization or simply one other person.