Guys, 2015 was rad. I am super, crazy lucky that I published my first book, met a ton of new friends, traveled the country, got a sequel and saw AN EMBER IN THE ASHES become a bestseller.
But 2015 was a doozy in other ways. And that’s what I want to talk about. (Come on, you know me by now….) I could try to be poetic, but instead, I’ll just say:
–in 2015, 60 million people in the world are refugees and half of them are children. Half. That is 30 million children.
–Syria. Paris. Afghanistan. Ferguson. Charleston. Burundi. San Bernardino. Beirut. Alan Kurdi. Nepal. Baltimore. And more, and more, and more.
What strikes me about many of these wars/conflicts/attacks/abuses of power, is that they are caused by greedy, power-hungry or deranged adults making selfish, repugnant decisions. And the people who suffer the most are kids. And it should matter to us, because those kids are going to be the custodians of our world in a few years, and if they are not given support and care, how, exactly, are they supposed to do that?
I know it’s hard to know what to do about all the horrible stuff in the world. For the most part, you can volunteer time or money. So I’m going to make it a little easier for you to do one of those, by linking to three charities. All three of these charities have excellent ratings with charity watch organizations, and each does great work in their respective fields.
UNICEF and Save the Children are global organizations focused solely on assisting children who, through no fault of their own, are stuck in grievous and often life-threatening circumstances.
CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) is a national and state-specific organization that trains and assigns volunteers who advocate for abused and/or neglected kids dealing with the broken foster care system.
I have personally donated to all of these charities, and support their missions. This holiday season, amid the joy and family and fun, please don’t forget that there are kids out there living in terrible fear and uncertainty. They deserve aid–in whatever form–from those of us who are lucky never to have known such things.
Thank you for reading and donating I hope you have a wonderful holiday!