Lots of driving/thinking/planning

posted by Patty James @ 5:10pm, Saturday 22 May 2010.

Yesterday I was in Maine interviewing kids thanks to Jan Brogan. Jan taught my kids and she and her husband retired to Paris, Maine, a sweet little town. Their house in incredible as is their century-old barn. Jan is retired from many years as a school teacher, but volunteers now at the local high school. She is really quite amazing and I am so thankful she is helping these kids who really need her. The kids she helps might fall through the cracks if it weren't for the teacher and volunteers like Jan. I truly enjoyed these kids and Emily and I had a long chat after the camera was off. I am now her personal nutritionist.

Here's Jan...


This is their kitchen. The teal-colored cabinet is the refrigerator. Perfect in this house...The dishwasher is also hidden.



Here are the kids!












Several of the kids complained about walking down the street and breathing in cigarette smoke-I hear this quite a bit actually. Emily decided this year that she was drinking way too much soda and weaned herself. I could go on and on. Many times the kids tell me a lot after the camera stops. I won't share much of what they tell me (all across the country) but I will remember. I am so thankful they trust me enough to share personal information.

So yesterday afternoon I decided I couldn't justify an afternoon off (even though we had already driven 3 and a half hours) and thanked Jan and her husband and the doggies and I continued down the road. We slept in Massachusetts last night and today drove 600 miles through Mass., Pennsylvania, N.Y., and tonight we are in a little town outside of Cleveland, Ohio. Tomorrow is only 355 miles-piece of cake. Tomorrow night I will empty and clean this rental car and return it on Monday to the airport. Tuesday are kids interviews thanks to Victoria and then I have down-time until June 5th when I head to Atlanta and then to Florida to pick up the R.V. I really never have down-time as there is always so much to do, but I love most of it, so it's all fine.

When you have 10 hours in the car, your mind works quite a bit. I have many things figured out now. I can feel myself shifting into a different mode-my business woman hat is slowly getting put back on. Passive income has been on my mind. I simply can't work 24 hours a day and need to think of ways to create income for STL and myself-just a roof and food :)

Now that school is over for the semester, Kathryn is heading to the 'Volunteer Center' to start working on locating grants. Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey has offered to write letters of support for every grant we apply for which should really help a lot. My focus is still on traveling and kids interviews but at night I work on my book and also curriculum.

A new friend Amanda from NYC owns an organic t-shirt company called To Live By (as in words to live by.) My friend Nancy Easton introduced us. She does inspirational words t-shirts including the 'Feed Your Children Responsibly' shirt that Nancy wore in some of my photos. She has also worked with Michael Pollan on the t-shirts he used in his movie 'Fresh.' She and I have come to an agreement on the financial part of the t-shirts for STL, but are still working on the right slogan. I'll let you know when we have the final 3 slogans and you can all vote on your favorite. I am diligently working on other sources of income. This year I will have spent almost everything I have on this project and next year, funds will be incoming, not outgoing. Well, they'll be outgoing to on film editors, DVD's, program development, but grants will pay for those things. Ideas pop into my head constantly.

I haven't been able to find much decent to eat these past couple days. I managed to find a little health food store in a teeny town in Maine and bought raw nuts, hummus and celery, which was yesterday's food. No such luck today. You're not going to believe where I ate tonight-the only place around, other than fast food. Olive Garden. I had a salad, but I am mainly telling you this because my server, Ashley, and I had a great conversation and she is going to email me to see how she can become involved with STL. Ashley is why I was there!

That's it for today....I'm going to take a bath and try to shut off my mind....I hope.

Chicago, here I come! I'm excited!