Two charity shoutouts – children’s art needed around the theme of Good Ideas, and encouragement to visit the site of a poet/writer fighting Lyme disease

I’m also helping to put on an art auction of very young children’s art to benefit a global humanitarian project of San Jose State University’s Entrepreneurial Society. As the quarter proceeds we will brainstorm and decide on an organization dealing with some global issue (malaria, AIDS, hunger, child labor, pollution, tree planting, clean water, literacy, etc) and auction art off to wealthy venture capitalists to fund our chosen project. This event takes place December 4th at the reception after we present our own business plans to the investors.

They’re looking for art by young children (any style/medium OK but something that can be hung up on a wall.) The theme is “Good Ideas” – either a business idea they child has, or an invention, or a place filled with things they child thinks are good ideas.

If anyone here has young children, teaches, works with kids, or knows of kids who would like to participate (and the kids can come see their art on the walls in SJ State if they would like) then please send a scanned PDF/JPEG to our vice president Ruth Gonzalez at rkgonzalez@gmail.com with the child’s name, age, and an artist’s statement describing the work.

You may also send artwork via mail to:

Ruth Gonzalez
700 Vasona Street
Milpitas, CA 95035

Also I encourage you to check out http://www.helphealfran.org – website for Fran Varian, a talented poet/author/human rights activist/community builder from San Francisco who’s battling late stage Lyme disease. She was bitten by a tick and came down with recurrent flulike symptoms, then was misdiagnosed for years before finally receiving a correct diagnosis and finding out she needed expensive treatments not covered by insurance.

I attended a benefit auction and art performance for her last night in SF near the Civic Center – excellent variety, from a guy playing bicycle handlebars as a musical instrument, to singers, folk music, poetry, humor, lovely art and music, etc. Some acts were serious and beautiful, others more lighthearted and fun. Lots of love for Fran, which I admired though I’ve never met her.

So if you have some kind of chronic symptoms, please get a second/third opinion, don’t let the first doctor tell you it’s nothing or just stress. He/she might have inadvertently made a mistake and there are diseases which go undiagnosed till they are much harder to treat (Lyme, Crohn’s autoimmune digestive disorder, etc.) Also please check out the site…there is a place to donate but it’s not just about money, it’s about passing the site on, leaving notes of encouragement, perhaps donating some creative use of your time and talent to a benefit auction in your area, etc. People last night were offering to write stories on command, send recipes, etc in exchange for donations to Fran’s treatment.

If people are interested, for Fran or for any other charity or cause readers or contributors support, we can auction off advertising space or host a charity writing/art auction around the holidays. Please let Synchronized Chaos know by commenting and we can all organize something in the next couple of months.