What words can express....?

Greetings All!

How does a person go about talking about what happened on Wednesday night?

At a macro view for those who aren't on FB and weren't there, hundreds and hundreds of people drove to Ypsilanti, waited an enormous amount of time to get a table, and then waited to get their food.  They did it with patience, they did it with fun and excitement, and they did it to help out my family.

The previous high water mark for events like this was nearly doubled by the event, and it astounded everyone's expectations.

Some lame micro level observations:

• I was utterly amazed by the sheer number of people who drove out to spend time for the event, from so many different eras of my life.  A former girlfriend from HS, co-workers from my time in television, students who graduated 7 years ago, and a ton of people from this year.  It was a true spectrum of my life.
• People in Belleville like fried meat.  
• It was amazing how many students from so many years came out to support Amie.  I must be doing something right, occasionally.  :)
• When asked, the people of this community show up in force, and it is beyond overwhelming.

I'm going to stop writing, because all my words are feeling horrifically insufficient to the task.  I lack the language to say thank you to the levels that I feel needs to be said.  We cannot possibly express our gratitude and thanks to the level they deserve.  Thank you.

Amie is doing as well as can be, all said.  She's in the process of trying to regulate her GI process, and is moving back towards normal.  I will spare you the details because after the last post, I'm sure I've warn out my poop welcome....and I know I'm going to do another post tomorrow about how it's Anya's birthday today.  That one will have lots of pictures.

Before I talk about this next part, I wanted to put up a disclaimer that there is no one in my life who is currently violating the diagram I'm about to reference.  

I just love the idea.

Lindsay, the friend who posted the John Green picture, posted the above diagram, with the accompanying article from Huffington Post, a few days ago on Facebook.  After reading the article, I thought about how awesome the idea is, and how nice it would be if everyone did this.

Here's the idea in a TL; DR - Comfort In, Dump Out. 

To start off, I'll describe what you see.  At the center of the diagram is the person suffering from an illness/catastrophe/seismic life event.  The circle directly outside of that is the most closest confidant/family member/life participant.  Each next circle is a person a little more removed from the person, all the way out to total strangers at the furthest edges.

When interacting with someone who is further in towards the center, you should never dump negativity, unasked for advice, criticism, whininess, or any other negative behavior.  They are struggling more than you, and you should not add to their burden.

If you feel the need to process what you've witnessed, what you're feeling, what you're dealing with...you dump those feelings out....that is you talk to someone who is more removed from the situation than you are.

If you are interacting with a person inside the circle, you add comfort.  Whether that be a listening ear, a hug, a kind gesture, a whatever. You add comfort into the experience....you give what you can, you keep what you have, and dump out what you can't handle.

Putting that into practice, Amelie is at the center of the circle.  Shelley is one step closer than I am.  I try to be a listening ear more than anything else to Shelley, and not offer advice to what she's doing.  She's doing her absolute best to provide for Amelie every minute of every day, excepting when I'm there. My sister and parents are further out of the circle, and my coworkers further out from that.  

With this diagram and idea, we consciously consider our roles in each others lives, and then give to the inner circles what they need to survive/weather the crisis that they live within in their daily lives.

Like I said, not an indictment by any means of anyone's behavior, but something I think is really awesome in guiding behavior towards anyone in a moment of crisis, no matter what that may be.

Another post tomorrow with pictures from Anya's birthday dinner and then birthday party.  But for now, I want to get this one on the road.

One final thing...  I made this picture I'll post at the bottom of my blog from now on as a reminder to click on the ads before you leave.  It's making us a stupid amount of money, and we'd love for that to continue with something so easy to complete on your end.  So thanks again!