World AIDS Day 2011

Here's a free download MP3 of my song Fallen Friends written for my cousin Peter and many of my fallen friends. 

AIDS continues to be a huge global health issue. My personal world was rocked in 1989 after losing my cousin Peter VanderPutten to AIDS.  He was among many of my friends who succumbed to this disease.  Back in 1989 it seemed the world was ending, then friends started to live, some today are still on crazy cocktails of drugs, but living practically normal lives.  But AIDS isn't going away, it's a horrific illness and is the source of huge loss to our global communities.  I continue to be mindful of this truth every day.

Today I think of those lost. In Peter's memory and to those continuing to be infected daily around the world.  We can and must do better.  Life saving yet expensive drugs are not available to all. Education must be focused towards the removal of cultural stigma and aloofness among those too young to remember the early days. Ignorance that endures with the cruelty of troubling and confusing information only make things worse.

link to World Aids Campaign

Cool People Care post on World Aids Day

Take a moment today to remember, inform and be safe.

Thankful to Buy Nothing Day

Happy Thanksgiving, 

I hope that you can take the time to enjoy family and friends this Thanksgiving. To all my non-American friends may this message find you able to take time to be Thankful in some way. Here in the US, I'm saddened that mega consumption, through internet sales and early store hours minutes after our meal is finished, has set a place at the table. Thanksgiving Day which has been the least capitalistic holiday of the year is being co-opted by the right to shop. Can't we have one day off people?! So between eating the cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie, we'll be seduced into logging on and firing up the credit card. And 'Black Friday' lures people into impulse buying because of a discount. It gets nuttier and nuttier. We should instead be sharing a story or try to be in some kind of stillness. Friday after Thanksgiving should be a wonderful shut down day, to be whimsical, a day for reflection, not shopping, or working.  

I'm loving the Buy Nothing campaign seen popping up around the net. Buy Nothing Day to give Thanksgiving new meaning. Cool People Care's Sam Davidson writes on his blog "Nada For Me," pledge to buy nothing this Friday and stay out of the shopping whirlwind.

and Adbusters who encourage a Buy Nothing Day. Adbusters uses grassroots capitalism to start business ventures, spreading indie culture and providing ever more alternatives to buying from mega corporations. 

We Americans work so hard at working hard and take little time to just decompress. Now becoming contagious throughout the world, this is not some American invention we should be proud of.

So try and pledge to stay away from online sales Thursday, and the stores on Friday. 

Look to the sky, find a star, make a wish, smile at someone, anyone.  Makes you feel good. Or if you absolutely have to go online, watch some of my "What's Your Inspiration?" clips where I have filmed many commuters happy to chat and share their stories, their challenges and loves, and of course their inspirations.

Check out my "What's Your Inspiration?" channel on youtube. 

I'll be back in the subway December 5th.

Update on 2011-12-05 21:05 by NYC Subway Girl

I've been receiving lovely comments to this posting, here's some excerpts including a wonderful Illustration from artist Dianne Engleke.

• consuming much besides food has become a drag.  It's about time.  Anyway, I liked your alternative and would add music, some blues, old carols, and lieder.  Perfect.  And some family....
• 'stay home and stay off the internet'', that's our motto!
• I love the idea of "BUY NOTHING".  We need to be simpler to appreciate our lives.
• I am with you with the nada for me. I have NO intention of going anywhere near any stores this weekend
• I absolutely love the Buy Nothing Campaign, not only because it is something unique but also the cause to give Thanksgiving a different meaning.
• Those are wise words from you,  for every day of the year.

image by Dianne Engleke

Memorial Day 2011

Memorial Day weekend is what we call the unofficial start of summer, here in NYC it does feel like summer.  It's beautiful.  I'll be happily singing at my cousins wedding in Brooklyn and then heading upstate for the rest of the holiday.  

All the warm and happy festivities aside, Memorial Day was created as a way to honor those who have fought for our Country.

On Monday we'll wake up early and join other community members to gather on the town green to honor Memorial Day with VFW guards, placement of a wreath and a reading of a proclamation usually from the President or Governor Cuomo.  America is in our 10th year of war in Afghanistan and still present in Iraq.  The least we can do is to take a moment of silence and give thanks to those fallen soldiers of today and the past.

This Memorial Day I hope like me, you go out and find where people are gathering to remember.  Maybe it's a local VFW remembrance, or a visit to a cemetery, especially with your children, they need to know.

here's a link to Governor Cuomo's Memorial Day message

I regularly like to share the work of Sam Davidson's Cool People Care site.  Today he writes about the travel weekend and how to get where you're going more efficiently it's worth a look.

Memorial Day cartoon by Joe Heller (used by permission, thanks Joe)