"A Saturday Night Happening!"

"A Saturday Night Happening!"

Now, I have a feeling this could end up reading like a description of a neighborhood party on the Social page of a small town newspaper (no criticism of such informative pieces intended), but that's a little like how it felt. To better introduce this blog post and review: Maple Grove United Methodist Church, the Folk Ramblers (Bill Cohen & Carl Yaffey), and Bill's Backers joined forces for a fundraising kick-off on behalf of the 2014 Walk to Defeat ALS organized by The ALS Association Central & Southern Ohio Chapter. This year's walk in Columbus will be held at a new location, the Columbus Commons, on Sunday, September 21.

So, around 250 supporters crowded into Maple Grove's fellowship hall for a Folk Music Sing-a-Long (a statistic not to be shared with the fire department!). What a hoot! Bill observed distinctly hearing on several occasions beautiful 85-part harmony! It was great - singing folk songs of old with family, friends, and folk music fans! I remembered singing most of them in the Ottawa UM church basement and fellowship hall; the family or living rooms of high school friends; the Camp Wesley paneled room; and various places on ONU's campus during college.

The Folk Ramblers warmed us up, beginning promptly at 7:00 pm, with three or four timeless pieces and then introduced me to share a few words. I have a feeling some thought I was going to preach and were relieved to find out I only had about three minutes worth typed into my Verbally app on my iPad (I'll end this blog post with it).

On my way to the center of the room I decided I had to at least try and mention a few of those who had gathered for the cause. My voice and energy limited how many I could note so my intention is to expand it a little bit for this piece. (This is the part that is going to sound a little like a report of a gathering in one of our backyards in Ottawa or Continental. I decided to write it this way because of a friend's comment at the event about appreciating seeing the names of the Cimbles in a recent piece.) First, I had the members of our family stand. There were about 15 of them including our children, Jeremy and Megan, and grandson, Evan, my two sisters, Nancy & Phyllis, Dorothy's sister, Susie, two brothers-in-law, Gary & Tim [Jefferson Award Winner!], a niece, Anji, and her family, a nephew, Peter, and his fiancee, Katie, and many others in spirit. We can never say enough about how fortunate we are to have the support and love of our families.

Others noted included: Marlin Seymour, Executive Director of the ALS Chapter; Clint Clouse and his son, Drew, from Tiffin - we met Clint last fall when we stopped to see him and his wife, Chris (Ruhe), a fellow PALS who passed away a few weeks after our visit and sister to two of my high school basketball teammates, Dave & Butch); Deb Jenkins Valentine, one of my YF "kids" from my first journey through Lima who came all the way from Atlanta; and then I ran out of steam and played the below recording.

If I hadn't tired, I would have also noted Bruce Hays and his wife, Mindy, who drove up for the evening from Celina. Bruce and I competed against each other in football and track in high school and were teammates in both sports at ONU. I would have mentioned the Continental schoolmates of Dorothy's, Randy & Linda Coble and Ken & Betty Kosch; our friends from Lima, Ben & Nancy Rose; the numerous members of Maple Grove, North Broadway, and Worthington UM churches; the retired UM clergy friends, Russ Clark, Jim (Mary Kay) Freshour and Keith (Laverne) Nash; and the still active neighboring sisters of the cloth, Rev. Cyndy Garn of Worthington and Deb (Gary)Stephens of North Broadway; a friend of Nancy's and mine, Barb (Dickinson) Tornatzky (Bob) who was part of the high school group that got together to sing those old songs in our homes; Randi Cohen, Bill's wife and a good friend from my active days in the neighborhood, who ran the sound controls; Jack & Maxine, our Aldrich neighbors who had to leave early to go watch the UD game; Eric Chivington and his little girls who stole the show with their dancing; the new PALS and his wife we met that night and look forward to meeting some more at our monthly ALS support group meetings;  and the numerous Folk Music enthusiasts and Bill Cohen loyalists.

Yes, it was a grand evening of music and laughter and trivia. Oh, and we raised close to $4,000!! Further thanks are included in the message from my iPad with the aide of the Verbally app below:

"Good evening! First, Dorothy and I want to thank Bill Cohen for suggesting tonight's Folk Music Sing-a-long. When he talked to pastor Glenn last fall about holding this event and then shared the idea with me, I enthusiastically thanked him but warned him that I was unsure how much self-promoting I would be able to do by then and even if it would be possible for me to still be going to things. Well, we are here and I think you are all probably a little tired of the amount of information you have had to read and see.

"Second, we would like to thank Miriam Abbott for agreeing to play the role of event coordinator between the church and Bill. We also want to thank whoever else she successfully roped into helping with this ALS Benefit. I know Mozart's deserves to be thanked for their generous gift of cookies. What a combination Miriam and Anand are! Two people who do a lot to make Clintonville the special place it is.

"We would also like to thank Pastor Glenn and all of the Maple Grove staff for their going the second mile so many times these last few years to remind us that we are loved and cared about.

"We are most appreciative of Kevin Parks and the This Week newspaper for helping not only publicize tonight's event but continue to share the story of this journey with ALS we are on.

"And finally, thanks to all of you for coming tonight to add your voices and gifts to this new Bill's Backers sing-a-long fundraising event on behalf of the ALS Association. I believe a couple members of the staff are here tonight and I hope you get a chance to meet them.

"While I lament I can not share these words with my own voice, I know you are relieved because otherwise I'd say more than this. So, Bill and Carl, Let's sing!"