Stuff

Sometimes I list a few fun items in my monthly newsyletter. You can subscribe to my monthly newsyletter, delivered monthly through MailChimp. That newsyletter is not archived on my website.

What you’re reading right now is my kinda weekly blog. This is Simone Uncensored. BEWARE!! Tons of Social Commentary in this Uncensored blog. Politics and lousy fundraising and poor nonprofit management and music and funny videos and silly stuff. This is a separate subscription.

And bouts of professionalism like Resources/Research and and and…

So today is music. Because sometimes only music helps. Sometimes the music makes me cry. And then I realize that I’m crying for the world and myself. Sometimes the music makes me should and dance and yell very loudly. (That’s when my business associate, life partner usually calls me from upstairs and (mostly) ungraciously asks me to stop all the noise. Even I don’t blame him for that ungraciousness.

How about ending 2020 with some silliness … Fauci on a Couchi

AND NOW ONTO THE MUSIC

1. I’ve shared Pentatonix with you in a previous newsyletter. And here’s more!!!

Amazing Grace

Bohemian Rhapsody

Imagine           And pay particular attention to the signs….

God Only Knows

And so many many many more from Pentatonix.

2. Re-discovering Dire Straits and Mark Knopfler

Telegraph Road

Sultans of Swing

And check out the 9 movie soundtracks that Mark has composed. Start with The Princess Bride!! And check out Willy DeVille’s other version, years later.

3. Discovering Billy Bragg — Thanks to Rob Ayles at Tufts University: Waiting for the Great Leap Forward

4. And the movies Notting Hill…Love Actually…Four Weddings and a Funeral… And on and on and on….

Just some stuff as we begin the new year…2021…

Special thanks to Wendy Weinstein who responded to my blog’s return with these 2 marvelous quotes to join those that I had posted. Wendy is the Director of Development at the Clay Art Center, Port Chester NY.

Thank you thank you, Wendy…For these glorious additions.

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” (From our beloved Martin Luther King, Jr.)

And from the brilliant author Maya Angelou: “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

All this is leadership and social justice. Fundraising and donor centrism and governance and management. And life, too.

Hello, again.

Wow. I haven’t written a Simone Uncensored Blog since August 3, 2020. 3 months ago.

But I’m back now.

First: Remember that I do publish my newsyletter monthly. Subscribe on my website. T’is a traditional newsletter – but I call it a newsyletter. Mini articles. Suggested resources. And some stuff just for fun.

Second: You can subscribe to this (mostly) weekly blog, Simone Uncensored on my website, too. Yes, separate subscriptions. Always remember that Simone Uncensored is ME…UNCENSORED. Longer articles. Really candid. Often provocative and maybe even ranting and raving about something.

I’m gonna start easy after my 3-month hiatus. I just want to share some quotations. Quotations that make me hopeful, give me strength, and some level of peace.

I think I’ve told you before that I’ve collected quotations since my high school years. Little notebooks. So many handwritten.

So here goes…In honor of of the US 2020 election and… And to remind us of how much more work there is to do.

• “Hope has two daughters, anger and courage. They are both lovely.” (Saint Augustine)

• “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” (Martin Luther King, Jr.)

• “This is the oldest story in America: the struggle to determine whether ‘we the people’ is a spirtual idea embedded in a political reality – one nation, indivisible – or merely a charade masquerading as piety and manipulated by the powerful and privileged to sustain their own way of life at the expense of others.” (Stated by Bill Moyers in June 2003. At the “Take Back America” Conference.)

And for those of us working and volunteering in the philanthropic sector: From the Greek word “philanthropia” (love of humankind). And my favorite definition of philanthropy…voluntary action for the common good. (That’s from Robert Payton, one of the early greats of philanthropy.)

• “Philanthropy is commendable, but it must not cause the philanthropists to overlook the circumstances of economic injustice that make philanthropy necessary.” (Martin Luther King, Jr.)

• “Charity is good, but supporting and creating social change are about power. Power can infuse lives with purpose and dignity. That opens up the possibility of joy. The life of the giver, as well as that of the receiver, is transformed…No matter who we are, no matter how much money we have, whatever our color, gender, age, religion, or language, we can bring change to the world around us. We can open our minds, rool up our sleeves, and reach out our hands.” (Alfre Woodard – in her preface to the book Robin Hood Was Right, 2000)

SOME WONDERFUL BOOKS TO READ…As we struggle to move forward…

• Robin Hood Was Right: A Guide to Giving Your Money for Social Change (Collins, Rogers, Garner)

• You Can’t Be Neutral on a Moving Train (Howard Zinn)

• The Self-Made Myth (Miller and Lapham)

• Make Trouble (Cecile Richards)

• Between the World and Me (Ta-Nehisi Coates)

Have some fun!

The Liar Tweets Tonight

The Evolution of Dance…Ricardo Walker’s Crew

The Day Democracy Died

The Grand Rapids (Michigan – my home state) LipDub … Don McLean’s The Day the Music Died

PERSONAL…….. Sometimes I just feel weird … and kinda sad … and …  (And, of course, so do you and so does everyone else, too.)

I was listening to DANIEL over and over… The Elton John/Bernie Taupin song. Elton is the famous one. But without Bernie’s lyrics??… So maybe I feel badly for Bernie?

And DANIEL always makes me think of Nam. Nam (Vietnam) was my war. For my generation. My first husband. My brother. Even my father … as Papa Georges used to say: “Why do you Americans think you can win in Vietnam? The French never did.” Ah yes, French Indochina…L’Indochine… My dad served in the Free French Army after the liberation (WWII). He and a bunch of his friends re-enlisted. (WTF?! I should have asked him why.) His re-enlistment papers were lost. That’s good. Because all of his re-enlisted friends went off to L’Indochine – and died there.

Have you ever read my story about Viet Nam?

Or how about this Simone Uncensored?

Shit…How did I start thinking about Nam this morning. WTF? Talking with my great accountant…another Tom. Talking about gift giving and then Elton John and then Daniel…And then Nam.

Maybe I need to cry?

Cry because of the world. The older world and Nam. The newest world and the coronoa virus.

One more listen to Elton and Bernie’s DANIEL. And then BENNIE AND THE JETS – to change the mood. Getting ready for a 10 a.m. client meeting. And I have 20 minutes to get it together!!