Ruffle in my feathers

Sharon here. Hope everyone had a good weekend! It was windy and weird all weekend and the Witkins took some time to do some "nesting". I have two large bins of passed-down maternity clothes so I organized those while my dear husband organized my closet. It got a little out of hand since Christmas and he knows me so well- see, I sometimes get a little overwhelmed and will not stay focused and organized. :) It helps to have some motivation from him and he'll help me to get the job done.

We went out to dinner last night with a former board member of mine from the Boys & Girls Club. I can post openly about this (minus the name of course) because this board member doesn't do the World Wide Web. He was the only board member I had to snail mail information to. :)

Anyway, he had Spencer and I and my former director and her husband over for dinner at Spring Island. Spring Island is a very elite, affluent community between Beaufort and Hilton Head. All the residents are retired, most live in the area part-time and all are incredibly generous. I don't dare say I know everyone on the island but I do know most their names as I've come across them in the donor database at the Boys & Girls Club and the hospital foundation.

We had a good time and our host couple toured us around the island and gave us a lot of background information on the development and nature of the area. (most of it we'd heard before but still nice). We went back to their home for drinks and hors de oeuvres- for me water- and then to the golf clubhouse for dinner. I was totally flattered as this former board member kept showering me with compliments about my work at the Boys & Girls Club... same for my former director.....

But a little funny, too. This board member was the one board member I came home complaining about. He's a nice person with obviously good intentions working on the board of a non-profit. To better explaing, my job while at the Club was to raise capital dollars for a new Teen Center and we started the campaign creating campaign materials. We had an incredible picture of a teen climbing a near-by climbing wall. There were so many great correlations between the picture and the campaign effort- climbing to new heights, moving up, etc., etc. The kid was black and you can bet your bottom dollar he had never "climbed" a wall like this before and it showed with the biggest, whitest smile you've ever seen. I thought it was perfect!! But, this board member did not want me to use the picture on the front of the brochure in fear that old, Southern folks would not give money to a campaign for black children.

I cannot express my frustration accurately enough!!!!! It's a Teen Center for disadvantaged youth- in Beaufort, SC. Most of these kids are going to be black. I couldn't change that no matter what picture I used on the front of the brochure.

Anyway, I thought it was nice of this guy to have us over and it was really nice for him to compliment my work at the Boys & Girls Club. But I was a little surprised at that almost 4 years after the picture "discussion", while we were talking last night at dinner, he said again that 'ya know, a lot of white people just won't give money to build a building for black kids.'

And this after over $3 million dollars was raised and the center has been open, running successful programs-keeping kids out of trouble!!- for almost 2 years.