Do-Gooder

Today is the first day of the Jewish New Year.  I can't remember what year it actually is - either 5775 or 5776 or possibly nothing close to that - but nevertheless today is the beginning of a sparkly fresh annum.

In the vein of New Years Resolutions and all that, I've decided that I'm going to make an effort to do some good deeds in 577...whatever.  Being a self-involved narcissist is great for the sake of humor, but I could really use some karma points in case heaven is an actual place and not just how I refer to the "emerging designers" section at Bloomingdales.

Since misery loves company I'm going to kick off my year of good deeds by giving you, dear readers, the opportunity to join me.

Imagine this: your middle school-aged daughter is crossing the street on her way between classes when, out of nowhere, she and her two friends are struck by a car.  Unsurprisingly, she sustains some pretty massive injuries and ends up with a traumatic brain injury.  The good news is that she has every chance of recovering fully with the help of daily therapy.  Here's the catch: the therapy that will, by all accounts, return your child to normal function costs $1100 per day and it's not covered by insurance.

Sadly, this isn't just some fodder for every parent's nightmare, but something that really happened to a girl living a few miles away. 

So, what do you do when the cost of therapy isn't covered by insurance and you're not a millionaire?  You thank your lucky stars for the incredible group of classmates who raise money to help pay for your recovery by selling t-shirts and smashing pies in their faces.  Just take a moment here and really let it sink in that a bunch of preteens care enough about a fellow student to come up with a way to make it possible for her to recover faster.  Uh, that's kind of putting us narcissistic adults to shame, isn't it?  I mean, the nicest thing I've done for someone else recently was making sure that no one stole her purse at the playground.

Let's band together and make this new year an altruistic one as apposed to a narcisstic one.

Buy a t-shirt.  It costs less than that Nars lipstick you've been eying, and the buzz from doing some good will last a lot longer than your lip color.

(Plus one of my adorable nephews designed the shirt and I want him to see his mad art skillz crusing down every street in LA)

Shana Tova, my friends.  May 577? be a sweet, healthy and bountiful year for us all!

xoxo