This is a great way to support street kids in Rwanda for whom we provide an education, meals, and medical assistance. It also helps with building a trauma-informed place for them.
twitter.com/ImanaKids…
Tag: helping
The moniker “legend” gets thrown around quite a lot, but Nicholas Winton is the epitome of the word. What a man.
twitter.com/valaafsha…
It’s been a long-standing vision of the Rwandan ministry our family is involved with to build Hope Village, a trauma-informed place to help the most vulnerable in that society: the street kids. We learned today that all systems are now go! Praise God!
Join Mr. T in saving the ta-tas!
twitter.com/MrT/statu…
Fun fact: I have literally been Santa Claus. In the suit, fake beard, everything.
twitter.com/IntentFat…
In April 2016, I will be heading back to Rwanda to assist in caring for some kids at an orphanage in Kigali, the nation’s capital. My team members and I will be working with kids who have experienced trauma or who come from a difficult background. We will be focused on providing activities and experiences that teach forgiveness and lead to redemption and healing. Dr. Karyn Purvis, renowned child development psychologist, is fond of saying “Children were harmed in relationship, and the only way they can be healed is through relationship.” That is what this trip is about, to help these kids begin healing by engaging them. They need to know there are people who care about them.
You can assist me with this trip in two ways: one, by praying for me, my team, and the kids we are going to help; and two, by donating to my trip account with Visiting Orphans through purchases in their online store. Yes, you can shop, and help me go to Rwanda!
You can find shirts, hoodies, handmade necklaces and leather cuffs, bracelets, bands, and other charms. You can visit the store at this link:
Visitng Orphans Store
Shop to your heart’s content, and when you are ready to check out, follow these instructions so a percentage of the sales can be donated to my trip:
- On the main checkout page, beneath your billing and shipping address information, you will see a section titled “Donation Information”. Click on the button marked “Team member or ministry name”.
- This will reveal a drop-down menu, and a text box. In the drop-down menu, please select “Rwanda April 2016 Healing Trip (Leader: Higgins)”.
- In the text box for “Team Member”, please type “Christopher Turner”. It should look like this:
That’s it! These are some unique items you cannot find anywhere else, and they make awesome gifts!
patrickrhone / journal » Blog Archive » Remembering Rodney
Every year, on this day, I take some time out to remember my friend Rodney. Rodney committed suicide via a gunshot to the head on June 15th, 2002 after a long struggle with depression. He was a dear friend, Mac fan, and talented writer. I miss him dearly.
Every time Apple releases something incredible or posts record sales, I can’t help but think about how much he would have been enjoying it. That is, as much as depression or the medicines used to treat it allow you to enjoy anything.
Some who know me know that I live with bi-polar disorder (manic depression). I have spoken about it before. I have been hospitalized for attempted suicide myself many years ago.
There is no real cure. After many years of medication and therapy treatment that had varying degrees of success, I now use a combination of mindfulness meditation and non-violent communication to help me navigate through it. It has been the most successful of all.
That said, there are struggles. I would be a liar if I said that I don’t understand what it was that made Rodney ultimately pull the trigger. Despite having a successful job, a loving wife, a nice house, and being a respected writer for several sites, none of those things matter when the chemistry in your brain decides it is time to go and that it will never get any better.
This day also happens to be my wedding anniversary so it is always a bit bittersweet. In fact, I normally wait until the 16th to post this but, for some reason, that did not feel right this year. I guess because the fact is that he died today. That there is no glossing over it. That denying such is in some way denying that life is filled with both things gained and loss. That both are OK and deserve all of the emotions appropriate for each.
Finally, if you or someone you know is suffering from a mental disorder, I urge you to use compassion and empathy when speaking with them about it. But, please do so. Ask them to seek whatever help they can. Let them know how you feel.
Not sure what more to say other than thank you for listening to me fight through the tears once again.
Fuck suicide. Fuck it to hell.
P.S. The best way to celebrate a writer is to read his writing, most of which is linked or archived on Low End Mac.
Note: For a few who have asked, here is the book that has guided me on using mindfulness meditation to treat my mania and depression: The Mindful Way through Depression: Freeing Yourself from Chronic Unhappiness by Mark Williams, John Teasdale, Zindel Segal, Jon Kabat-Zinn
Also, I would be an idiot for not mentioning… National Suicide Prevention Lifeline – With Help Comes Hope
I had the pleasure of several e-mail exchanges with Rodney, and had hoped to meet up with him at a Macworld Expo some time in those very early Aughts. I wouldn’t say we were friends, but I certainly miss his wit and writing.
I will echo Patrick: suicide is not the answer. There are people who want to help you. Please utilize those resources.
A tip for fellow writers:
I use Michael Tsai’s outstanding SpamSieve on my Mac to control e-mail spam. Based on the training I give the program, it actively and automagically sorts spam into a designated folder, leaving my inbox pristine and filled only with the e-mail I want to receive.
Now, what to do with all that spam collecting in that aforementioned designated folder?
Most folks would simply delete it all, and too bad if something found its way there that shouldn’t be. Some folks, myself included, would give it a quick going-over, to make sure their spam-filtering software hadn’t flagged a false positive: a “good” e-mail inadvertently labeled “bad”.
And an enterprising fiction writer would tap this new-found wealth for character names.
I mean, where else are you going to discover “Abdul Travis”? What a great name for a fictional character! (When I first saw that one, it sounded like something one would read in a William Gibson novel.)
So I created a new text document in BBEdit, gave it the oh-so-original title of “character names.txt”, and starting dumping in names from my spam e-mails.
I’m not sure how many pieces of spam I went through, or how long I did this, but the current document has 456 different names in it. And by virtue of receiving upwards of 5,000-plus spam e-mails a week, I always have a ready source for more names if I need them.
So skip those fancy character-naming programs, fiction writers. You’ve got a wealth of names right there in your e-mail client.
I remind him to watch the cars, to look the drivers in the eye and make sure they see him. His brothers and I sit in the minivan while he goes to the curb and waits for a chance to walk out to the girl. Finally a car stops to let him pass. The girl’s face is turned down; she sees nothing but the ground. I watch my son’s narrow shoulders as he crosses the drive, and I am praying that no harm will come to him, not now or ever, that someone who is this loving will be spared the pain of the world, which is when I remember that it is Christmas, the time when we celebrate precisely the opposite, the coming of pure love to suffer for all we who sit with faces turned down, not even knowing what to ask for, knowing only in our crusted-over hearts that anything will help.