I thought I mioght finally get around to making a few no confessions. On Wednesday 3rd of April, I fell back into a couple of bad habits. 1) I borrowed some thing of someone elses. 2) I tried to break into something. I want to get this off my chest. On Wednseday, I borrowed my wife's sky blue biro and I also tried to open someone elses book shelf so I could give away a couple of books.
The night before a lonely man had been sitting in an internet cafe making a web page. That man had dreamed up this website a few weeks ago as spomething that might make the world a better place. Its at the following url: www.uniqreefrelief.wordpress.com. Its my vision for how to organise a positive social media awareness campaign designed at attracting a little bit of attention to one of the world's troubled spots- the Great Barrier Reef in Queensland. Garantseraph is actually a part of that project. This writing is supposed to help me document how I am a very ordinary, very flawed human being. And yet I still choose to TRY to change the world. I mean, why would I do that. Activism is for really, really talented people, influential people, famous people. It's for people with more power or stronger connections- for people awho are more linked in than me. Isnn't it? Change comes from above, doesn't it? Well, actually if I keep waiting around until I am the King of Denmark, who probably isn't a very powerful guy himself, if he exists at all, I'll basically be waiting forever. So I choose to believe that change is not a top down process. Nor does it begin at the bottom and work its way up. I choose to believe that it can start somewhere in the middle, right about where I am. It doesn't always, but it can. I believe that with all of the good and the bad things I have done in my life, my life has a positive meaning and direction. The battle in my little tiny human heart between good and evil, or skilfull and unskillful actions, or however you want to see that, hasn't been won yet. Not definitively. That fight is still raging. It rages every day. I mean, I have some pretty afflictive emotions but we all have to start from where we are. So I started my website. I like it. Its not very professional. I made my campaign myself. It's called Get Yourself a Paper Cup. I'm not even an NPO. I don't have any supporters or any funding, but I can getr myself a paper cup. I like my campaign. Why wouldn't I? I made it... myself... alone... with a pencil and a paper and all of the computer experience I have gathered from working as an AET in Japan. I have a friend in Germany, in Berlin. He challenged me to find my choices, to do something constructive. Well I tried to friend him on Facebook because I like him, and I trust him, I trust his judgement that there are dreams worth pursuing. I don't have to be Ghandi, just Grant. That's okay for me. I can use my social isolation, my anonymity as a springboard for my campaign, through my writing. A lot of people probably think I'm crazy, even to try to do what I'm trying to do. Because my ultimate goal is to find a way of making a lot of money for charities everywhere. With your help. See here's the thing. You have all the time in the world to jump on board, and get yourself a paper cup. They are pretty cheap. Starbucks and McDonald's users throw them away. This can be a symbol of taking garbage and manking use of it. Homeless people can be in my charity. Now thats pretty democratic.
So anyway, I don't have a lot of traffic yet. So I have been watching other people's campaigns. One of them I have had. my eye on was Light It Up Blue. That wasn't something I intended to happen. I just noticed it and I thought, really, tomorrow is Blue Day? What the heck is that? In cities all over the world people celebrate difference and try to promote greater autism awareness. Really? I hadn't noticed. So I thought, tomorrow is my blue day. And I did everything I could possibly think of to assist that cause that day. I started writing letters to kids in America, and sharing their photos. Basically just stuff I used to do as an AET. Write a few comments on people's page, suggest a few things to try to make the campaign better and try to represent SOMETHING. Then I realised, oh... In Japan, Blue Day has already gone and been. It's already April 3rd. Didn't I feel like the April fool. Well, I did. And I felt sorry for missing the chance to contribute positively for that worldwide campaign because I was too busy with my own stuff. I guess I'll wait around for the next one. But I realised that Autism deserves more than one day's notice. We can't let all the stories slip through the cracks. We have to try to make this 2013 sometrhing like the unofficial year of the different and uniquely gifted child. That's my vision. So, I borrowed my wife's blue pen and started writing on the inside of a couple of books. Happy Belated Blue Day and writing down a Facebook page that is run by Single Mothers Who Have Children With Autism. I wrote this inside of five or six books and tried to give them to a friend. He didn't want them, for probably good reasons. So I sat down on the drenched couch. And thought, this is not a bad place to be in life. To be trying to do a couple of good things before I die. Maybe, I can give them to someone else.
In my city of Nagoya, there is an old man who lives near Arahata who sells me books for 100 yen. He has some really good English books, like Reefer Madness, some Stephen King, Classics, Science Fiction like Neuromancer, James Ellroy and even Cormac McCarthy. So, I tried to put the books back on his shelf because thats where I had bought one of them. It was locked so I put them on top with a message for him to sell them on eBay and give the money to charity. Potentially, those books could make a difference. If not, I will at least have done this: linked the orddinary reader to a website that aims to meet the needs of single mothers who have children with autism. If this idea tpicks up, with permission, those mothers can donate books to libraries and good will shops, serving otherr causes too. Or perhaps they might want to include a photo of their child, and put it within the book. Or maybe they can make some bookmarks, with their kids. A lot of people don't realise this, but we are witnessing a phenomenon, I believe. At least a small one. The day after I saw other people had done smimlar things, maybe. Big people too. Major League Baseball is also involved in trying to increase awareness. Why don't you hop on board yourself, and start sharing some photos. Please.
Grant Higham, a supporter of single mothers who have children with autism. Joined April 3, belatedly, and in support of his first cousin, N.
Right
my campaign
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