Live United
A strong mentor and role model can change a child’s life, and Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Coastal Empire was founded with this solution in mind. Sometime adults are afraid to mentor a child for fear that they do not have anything to offer, but all it takes is one common interest to spark [...]
You are now aware that You are breathing. And that your clothes are touching your skin You just realize that there are things all around you And you are now aware of other things Like every time you swallow, you hear a tiny crackle. And your ears are a little cold You now are aware [...]
In times of crisis, every little expense or worry can seem like a huge weight. Eartha, a 42 year old mother of four, felt this burden after she and her children were left homeless when the family they were living with gave them one day to move out. Having nowhere else to turn, Eartha went [...]
In August of 2011, Kenneth Smalls was released from prison, having spent the previous 12 years serving time for stealing $50 – a crime he says he did not commit. In fact, so sure was he that he couldn’t be convicted of a crime for which he was not guilty, Kenneth took his chances with [...]
It’s been more than a decade since Nancy Hupper suffered two strokes that left her with severe impairment to her vision and cognitive abilities. Nancy was living in Florida, working in advertising sales and had just earned a degree in paralegal studies. She was happy, healthy and enjoying much success in her work life.
“You almost couldn’t see a baby, there were so many tubes and wires; and he was very, very swollen, you couldn’t recognize him,” recalls Nancy AuClair, mother of quadruplet boys. She is describing the scene of the youngest in the set, Connor, in the pediatric intensive care unit struggling to survive following surgery to remove a 12 cm tumor from his liver. He was barely nine months old. The scene worsens as Nancy tells of how Connor ‘coded’, or stopped breathing, several times post-surgery. “At one point, I told my husband that I’ve given him (Connor) permission to go; that it just was not fair to put him through it,” she recalls. But her husband, Chris, reminded her of something that she knew very well from experience – Connor was a fighter and had been from day one.
“I plan on going back to Liberia to visit someday, and eventually spend time in both places,” says 19 year-old Jared Kolleh.
Before fleeing his home in Monrovia, Liberia five years ago with his mother, Jared spent his first 14 years enduring the bloody civil war there. They struggled for survival, as the war dragged on, starting and stopping over and over. “It was pretty hard because we had to run through places where shooting was going on, trying to find food and things – we went through a lot,” he recalls.
April 20th saw hundreds of volunteers out for the 2nd Annual Savannah’s Big Give. The citywide volunteer service event is a partnership between the Westin Savannah Harbor, Liberty Mutual Legends of Golf Tournament, The Savannah Harbor Foundation and United Way Hands On Savannah that pairs community volunteers with nonprofits in need of assistance. The multiple service projects included in the Big Give provided repairs and beautification to organizations from Tybee to west Savannah. But of the day’s projects, one in particular turned out to be a truly serendipitous event.
They say that a man’s home is his castle – his refuge and a source of pride. But for the many homeless in our community, the sense of personal value that literally comes with the territory is elusive.
“I guess you could say it was an epiphany,” says Victoria Eden of her decision to come to Georgia. A single mother with four children at home, including her adult daughter Lauren, who is developmentally disabled, Victoria knows a thing or two about following her heart.
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