Moving Pro-Aging Messages out into the Culture

No photos this time. Sorry. Feeling very basic and unadorned at the moment.

This week was a busy one. Medifecta Healthcare Training, the company where I have worked for the past 12 years (now part-time) developing educational materials to train caregivers of elders was sold last week. We've been getting oriented to the excellent, upbeat new management and its dynamic programs. That feels really good -- and this kind of transition is also something that really gets your attention. There's a lot of new information, people and goals to learn about. Stirs things up.

Sage's Play was busy, too. Moving the pro-aging messages of A New Wrinkle out into the culture for me means not only being an artist, but also engaging in social change, fundraising, public relations and program development. Right now it's all about our upcoming fundraising campaign on IndieGoGo, which is an Internet-based crowdfunding platform. Our goal is to raise $15,000 in order to produce and film A New Wrinkle.

On Tuesday we got together with a videographer. He filmed us for a video that will introduce our IndieGoGo campaign. Before we met with him, I spent hours writing the script for the video, locating still shots and identifying music files to include in it. I am certainly curious to see the finished product. Will it be everything I hoped it would be? Even 80% satisfaction is good. Suspense. Curiosity.

Now I have to write the text that viewers will see when they visit our campaign site on IndieGoGo. I mulled that matter over while I pulled weeds and planted some snapdragons in the garden. But it will take more than mulling. I will have to sit down and write it. Very soon.

This week I also met with Gary Einhorn, my business advisor, and he helped me develop an action plan for the IndieGoGo campaign. It has a lot of items on it. Of course. It's an action plan. I've already done a few of the items on it, just to get a feel for all that action.

Gary and I met at the university library. When our meeting was done, we passed an old woman who was dragging her coat along. She seemed terribly tired. Her walk was slow and a bit erratic. I wondered if she was about to faint. I spoke to her and mentioned that her coat was dragging.  I asked if she was okay. She said she was though I had my doubts. What a lovely old face she had.

Later I realized that she had been a neighbor of mine when I lived briefly on Morton Street. I would see her ripping down the hill on her bicycle. Wow, I thought to myself then watching her fly down the hill, her helmet firmly on her head and a look of rapt enjoyment on her face. What a wild old woman. Now here she was all bedraggled, having gone on the bus to nearby Medford and then come back on the bus to Ashland. "I live five blocks away on Morton Street," she told me. "I'll just sit down here for a minute then go the rest of the way."

I offered to drive her home.  I thought she needed to drink some water and sit down and rest. She still rides her bike everywhere. She's 81. Ten years older than I am. I've been thinking of her since then, and thinking about how much change occurs in each decade of human life.

Tomorrow is Mother's Day. Two women I enjoy are coming to visit. They are volunteering to help with the IndieGoGo campaign. There are actually three volunteers, but the third is at a conference presenting a paper on women in the global community. I decided to call the volunteers the Sagesse Squadron. They are all marvelous individuals and I am looking forward to our collaboration.

The roses, peonies and love-in-a-mist are about to bloom in my garden. I hie myself to sleep, hoping that some bright dreams illumine the hours. Tomorrow is another day, as my Mother was fond of saying. Bless mothers and mothering.