Front Page
A friend sent "When You're My Age" a new song from Lori McKenna, warning me to get out the tissue.
“When you're my age
I hope the world is kinder
Than it seems to be right now
And I hope the front page isn't just a reminder
Of how we keep lettin' each other down”
He was right. The song was one more thing that has made me feel like crying this week. The sky is covered in the haze of Saharan dust, Coronavirus is spreading, and fireworks and 4th of July celebrations are canceled. All of this while we are confronting the darkest sides of our culture and society.
You have to look beyond the front page to find kindness. To see we aren't always letting each other down. These would be the stories from my front page this week.
Willie paid for the orders of strangers at the Peanut Shop. Holding a beer in one hand and rubber boots in the other, he had just gotten off work pulling electrical lines below the street.
A woman gave bottles of water to a couple walking down Highway 98. A toddler took his first steps on Dauphin Street.
Wearing a unicorn mask and a NASA T-shirt, 11-year-old Kennedy wants to be an astronaut because she was inspired by the women in Hidden Figures.
As Ginger Woechen wrote "Coming Soon Love and Light" where she would soon paint her mural on the wall of the United Way building, a young black man stopped his car in the middle of the street and ran up. Concerned the letters were graffitti, he offered to help clean up the wall.
Kearria Freed was shot in the head five years ago at a house party during spring break. She learned to walk and speak all over again and her service dog, Darling, helps open doors, turn on lights, and get food from the refrigerator. Kearria wore flowered headbands before the shooting and said they helped her feel better about herself in the hospital. She started the Pretty Girl Rock project, making flowered headbands for hospitals to give out to girls who need to feel pretty during hard times.
Rachel Webb is a foster mother who adopted three children. She started Fostering Together Gulf Coast six months ago because there were few resources to help foster parents. This week she moved into the empty office space that will soon become a support center for foster parents and foster children. There are 517 kids in foster care and 131 foster homes in Mobile.
Martha Miller started the Kindness Rocks garden in Fairhope during the Coronavirus. Each day she and a group of friends put out 25 or 30 rocks with paintings or positive messages such as "rise by lifting others," "stand up for the weaker," and "Happiness comes in waves. It will happen again." She hopes her rocks are a reminder that each of us is going to be okay.
Several mornings a week, Jim and Georgann Ellis uncover and document graves in Oaklawn Cemetery. They take photographs and stake PVC at sections and rows marking the plots. They enter each grave into Find A Grave with the history they find. They estimate 10,000 people are buried in the 22-acre cemetery that changed hands several times and was once “completely overgrown and seemingly forgotten.” Ellis said historical and burial information indicates Oaklawn primarily served the African American community in Mobile. He believes each person buried at Oaklawn has a story and together these stories form the history of Mobile that should be preserved and passed down.
Thomas Harrison died this week. He was a writer, newspaper editor and supporter of the Gulf Coast art community for many years, but he was also my copy editor. He reminded me that people are the heart and soul of stories. Care enough to tell their story well and the rest will take care of itself. These are the human connections where we can learn from each other.
Later in the song, McKenna sings:
“When you're my age
You'll still be full of questions
That I wish I had the answers to right now
And those dark times might make you second guess it
But I bet love will still be making the world go 'round”
No matter how bad the news looks on the front page, there will always be stories of love making the world go 'round.
