Tonight's picture was taken in November of 2007. Mattie was healthy back then and childhood cancer was not in our everyday lexicon. That day I took Mattie to visit Peter at his office. As you can see Mattie helped himself to Peter's dry erase board and began drawing away. There were many tell tale signs in a Mattie drawing. First and foremost there was always a SUN, then usually a tree or a bird, and lastly ground. There was always context to Mattie's pieces. Given that the sun was so predominant in Mattie's works, it seemed very fitting that it should be the symbol of Mattie's Foundation.
Quote of the day: It never leaves. It’s always there, watching, steadfast, knowing us in our light and dark moments, changing forever just as we do. Every day it’s a different version of itself. Sometimes weak and wan, sometimes strong and full of light. The moon understands what it means to be human. Uncertain. Alone. Cratered by imperfections. ~ Tahereh Mafi
When Mattie entered his first year of preschool, his lead teacher was Margaret. In Margaret's classroom, Mattie was known as "Mattie Moon." Basically this preschool assigns a symbol to each student that has the same first letter as the child's name. Needless to say, Mattie Moon was a catchy title. In fact, even some adults would refer to Mattie as Mattie Moon. However, this nickname seemed to take on more significance after Mattie died. In fact, I still have people who email from all over the country to tell me they spotted a Mattie Moon up in the sky. As if to tell me that Mattie was watching over all of us and most importantly that this glimmer of light in the night sky means he hasn't been forgotten. It is very touching in many ways.
Tonight I am up and working on different Foundation tasks and while sitting in Mattie's transformed room, at my corner desk, I looked out the window. To my surprise staring back at me was a Mattie Moon. Since I have moved into Mattie's room and work there most of the day, I have spotted all sorts of things outside Mattie's window. It is no wonder why Mattie used to love his windows. I remember one summer night Peter and I tucked Mattie into bed and then we went outside on our deck to sit down. Low and behold who was watching us from the window above???? It was Mattie. He used to love to stand on his bed and look out. Now I get why!!! I am carrying on the tradition and I am so happy to have migrated away from the kitchen table to a space of my own. A space that was once inhabited by Mattie.
Today was a day of many lessons to learn. This afternoon I went out to lunch with a colleague of Peter's who is a social media guru. She enlightened me about the issues with Facebook and how it really is not a good tool to build new foundation members, then we discussed Twitter, and other strategies. It is very clear to me that this woman understands the social media space quite well, so I will return to meet with her next week for a Twitter tutorial. I like Twitter even less than Facebook, and for those of you who know me, you know I rarely am on Facebook. But I realize this is how people communicate these days and in order to build up recognition a social presence is vital. I spent the rest of the day learning a whole new electronic newsletter system. The company who hosts our newsletter changed platforms. I can't tell you how long it took me to learn the OLD system, the fact that I had to learn a new one today wasn't greeted with a smile. In fact by the time Peter got home, I was snappy and ticky! But after about 10 hours working on this, I think I am proud to say I have mastered a new system and a November newsletter will be going out shortly!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment