Yesterday, I took our family to K-mart where we went shopping for supplies. Joan and I wanted to give our young children (aged 11, 9 and 5) some real sense of what the families in Haiti were going through.  Each of our children picked what they thought would be important. Sophie (the pragmatist) concentrated on water; and Hannah (who tends to fixate on doctor appointments) picked medical supplies. Max, age 5 (who fixates on being 5), first thought buying some toys might be good, but quickly changed his mind and decided on flashlights so no “other kids” would be afraid in the dark. And he demanded that we donate “self-winding” flashlights because you don’t need batteries and they are fun to wind. Smart kid.

We arrived at the make-shift distribution and staging center in the pouring rain. There were plenty of volunteers.  As trucks and vans arrived, the assembly line of people worked pretty well to load pallets of supplies.  SEIU was doing a terrific job of organizing everyone – and, as expected, people were helpful. I’m not one of those that believe there are ever silver-linings to tragedies like the one Haiti is experiencing, but I do believe the outpouring of support comes from the kind of compassion and sense of brotherhood that was a foundation of MLK’s life and struggle. 

So today we pause to thank a great man for inspiring our better angels.