City chicken

I met this chicken pecking around on a city sidewalk among plastic bags and cigarette butts, the only one of her kind in a place where there is not much to nourish her. 

I’ve been thinking today about those who prevail against great odds and how all of us--as writers, photographers, teachers, counselors--doing whatever we do--can offer our gifts and our privilege in service to people who are coping with unthinkable circumstances. 

A precious friend, Lisa Butler, is working on a project to empower some young South Africans to tell and document their stories. She and her co-worker Craig Henry have located a non-profit organization that offers support, counseling, and skills to a group of young people in Kwa-Zulu Natal whose lives have been impacted by HIV, AIDS, rape, poverty, and trauma. Lisa and Craig are going to meet these young people and give them, in the context of that support and counseling, an opportunity to communicate their remarkable stories and be heard.

Once that happens, and it is going to happen soon, Lisa and Craig will edit and curate the narratives and photographs and deliver them to galleries and venues where the rest of us arrange for them to be shown and appreciated. This is a program that could come to you, wherever you are, if you can find an organization to host it. I’m hoping to bring the stories to Portland, and I hope other Blip friends may arrange for the show to come to them. 

Here’s the website for the project, with an address to contact if you might be interested in arranging a show near you. There is also a crowd-funding site if you’re able to chip in a little cash to help make it all happen. Even if you can't afford to contribute, do click on the link and scroll down to the bottom. There's a very powerful video there which Lisa and her team created, about young people living with HIV, and about the question their adult caregivers must ask themselves: when, how, and under what circumstances do they tell the children that they are HIV positive?