In all fairness to the kids who do NOT give their teachers grief, and do not act as if they are entitled, I bring you Kieran, from Alabama.
Kieran is even now at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, as an incoming freshman there. Naturally, one does not wear one's hair long when in the Air Force.. Kieran had not cut his hair in six years, and he sported a 19” Afro. There are pictures, you can look it up. Anyway, he decided to have it all cut off and auction it off one inch at a time. At last count, he had raised $49, 000 and was giving it all to St. Jude for kids with cancer. He had donations from 44 states and four countries! He lost a friend to cancer when he was in the eighth grade, and it made a huge impression. As it would, for sure. But honestly, I do not know how he could stand that hairdo! It must have even been heavy, right?
Then, there are the thirteen kids in the senior class in an island off the coast of Maine. The tradition there was to raise money for a big senior trip. (We went to Denver on our senior trip). Since COVID made it tough to travel, they donated $5,000 of the money they raised just to help folks on the island affected by the virus, saying it would have seemed wrong to do something like a trip when so many were suffering.
There is also a blind teen swimming in the Paraolympics. And in Des Moines, students from Roosevelt High School cleaned up debris after the derecho last summer, helping a paralyzed man who certainly could not have done it himself. I love the name the students at this school call themselves. They are Rough Riders, after the fellows who rode with Teddy Roosevelt in the Spanish-American war. A lot better, in retrospect, than the Warriors we called ourselves at Waco!
In another area of good news comes the report that the incidence of Alzheimer's world wide is trending down. There are more cases, but folks are living longer, and cases are lower, percentage wise. So, maybe all the stuff we read about healthy living not being just good for our heart, but also for our brains, is accurate. I certainly hope so.
Along with that, my favorite beverage, coffee, which used to be heartily maligned, is now being credited for less liver disease, prostate cancer, melanoma, Parkinson's, depression, Type 2 diabetes, heart disease, obesity, and you guessed it, Alzheimer's.
All of these stories arrived in my in box last week from the Good News Network. And who can't use a weekly dose of good news? So, instead of reading about all these entitled kids, I will continue to look for the big hearted (and big haired) ones. Why don't you join me in this effort?
Until next time!
