Making Lemonade Out of Something Far Worse Than Lemons

Convince me, wrote Kate Baggott, the author of the Babylune blog, of the effectiveness and importance of your favorite charity, cause, or helpful organization, and I’ll donate to it in your name.

Capital idea, I wrote back, then set to the daunting task of determining which of the causes with which I’m familiar meet those criteria.

I so believe in the mission of my alma mater that I’ve gone to work there twice. It truly makes the world a better place by educating men and women not only in their chosen areas of study but also in critical intangibles such as reasoning, tolerance, ethics, and social justice. Then there’s Philabundance, the Philadelphia area’s hunger relief organization, which has been hugely successful in partnering with the superlative Preston & Steve Show on WMMR-FM for the duo’s annual Camp-Out for Hunger, to which I donate 40 pounds of food yesterday.

Then I thought of Alex Scott.

Alex was 4 and stricken with cancer when she and her brother set up a lemonade stand in their suburban Philadelphia neighborhood to raise money to help her doctors find a cure for her and other kids like her. That launched a national movement that to date has raised more than $16 million to battle pediatric cancer. Once I became a dad, stories about children in distress absolutely shattered my heart, and Alex’s was no different, especially when she passed away three years ago, at the age of 8. Yet her stunning gutsiness and generosity, while not easing the tragedy of such a loving soul taken from the world far too soon, may someday help others in her situation to survive instead of fall, and if that’s not emblematic of the season of giving, I don’t know what is. Therefore I humbly ask Kate to consider Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation as a worthy recipient of her gift. | 501(c)