Serial Killer Killed, but Rest Remains Elusive

Magnolia-plantation-audobon-swamp-sc1.jpgOn Sunday night I had a drink with a friend who recently moved down to South Carolina from New York to be with her boyfriend. She'd lived in Manhattan for six years, and was ready for all the amenities that most New Yorkers (except for Madonna) lack: a garage, a yard, and the feeling of security she enjoyed as a child in Wisconsin.


Then, in late June, a serial killer started murdering people with no apparent pattern. An elderly woman, a peach farmer, a 15-year-old girl and her father were all slain by the lone gunman, and my friend couldn't sleep for fear that she'd be next. Living in her town, about two hours south of Charlotte, placed her in the line of fire, so to speak, and the peace she'd moved there for was gone.


Early Tuesday morning, the man was killed in a botched burglary, and my friend will no doubt feel infinitely more at ease about going home than she was on Sunday night. But the fact remains: in many ways, she was safer living in New York than she is in the quiet, affluent community she moved to, a seaside haven for tourists where there are no street lamps because sea turtles are attracted to bright lights, making it impossible to go for walks after dark. So she stays home. "It's like Desperate Housewives," she told me.


It reminds me of something Mia Farrow said to Woody Allen in Husbands and Wives, when he mentions living elsewhere for a change: "You couldn't survive off the island of Manhattan for more than 48 hours."

 

Serving Up Sock Monkeys

sm3.jpgEvery semester Kenneth Cole Productions' Interns participate in an intern day of service to support various charities. This time the interns volunteered for the charity Fresh Art. Fresh Art is a non-profit organization that helps special needs artists expand their artistic and personal development. Thirty-nine interns contributed by making hand sewn sock monkeys. We worked vigorously for four hours and created some great pieces. Although some (like myself) found it difficult, in the end they all turned out to be really creative designs.


Check out our sock monkeys at the Kenneth Cole Store on 95 Fifth Avenue at 17th Street from June 24 - July 25, 2009.


To volunteer or donate to Fresh Art check out their website.


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Best Tribute to Michael Jackson

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Ken Griffey Jr. came to the plate while "Billie Jean" played and then sported one white batting glove in a game on Wednesday.


I think this is the best tribute I've heard about for one reason:


I love it when celebs act like kids -- but in a good way.


Not in that "I'm a spoiled brat"-kid way, but in that "I was a kid once and someone I admired died" way. It was just so simple, it was brilliant.


Thanks Junior.


[Image: Big League Stew]

The Rights Of Women In Morocco


CNN's "Inside Africa" is one of the best shows on television for getting a peek into the inner lives of sub-Saharan Africans who often live in repressive, closed regimes. Recently, the program has focused on Morocco and the effects of the 2004 Moroccan Family Law (Moudawana). After a 20-year battle women's groups in Morocco brilliantly persuaded King Mohammed VI to enact some of the most progressive family legislation in the Arab world. Although the law is not perfect, and there are reports of men circumventing it, the effects on the lives of Moroccan women have been incredible. For example: the minimum age for marriage is now 18 (up from 15). Also: Marriage now has to be certified by a judge, making it more difficult for men to simply abandon their wives. Could this be the model for the empowerment of women throughout the Muslim world?

Young Women's Action Team responds to economic crisis

A quick shout-out to an amazing group of young women from my neighborhood.


The Rogers Park Young Women's Action Team opened up a thrift store for teens this week. What's so amazing about that? All the items in the store are FREE.


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Mondays and Tuesdays from 1 to 6 p.m. The store will be open from July 6th to August 11th.

Store Location: 7067 N. Glenwood, Chicago


All items are FREE. Each person can take up to four items of clothing and three accessories.

This store is specifically for children and teens. We particularly welcome teen moms and dads to come to Thrifty teens to SHOP!

We have also been able to secure a donation of backbacks so feel free to pick up your back to school items from the Free Store.


Hopefully they will be able to find a way to keep the store open past August 11 -- at least until back to school shopping is over. And here's to them inspiring others to do the same around the country.

Kenneth Cole Made My Present Felt

Mark and Satchel.jpgMy husband, Mark, has a briefcase that is older than I can admit, because - of course - it would age him and me! It is a source of contention for my fashion savvy daughters, who view a briefcase as a purse that should be updated regularly. I have unsuccessfully purchased several briefcases to replace the object of shame, but Mark rejected them all. He can be frustratingly sentimental at times.


This year I resorted to more manipulative tactics. I had to target Mark's weakness, and this was diabolically simple. He is putty in my daughters' hands. I feel somewhat guilty at how easy it was. The girls consider shopping a sport so, they were enthusiastically up for the game. The family knew that Mark would use the new briefcase for years to come, so we had to be strategic in regard to style.


The girls found a chocolate brown Kenneth Cole briefcase that looked more like a schoolboy satchel. It was made to carry a laptop but big enough for documents too. We loved it and, of course, he couldn't resist the gift with the girls oohing and aahing over him. It was a closed case - goodbye to old faithful.


Before I could toss the receipt, however, I remembered the sales clerk telling me to enter a contest online. It was the Kenneth Cole Make Your Presents Felt Sweepstakes. The money, I was told, would be directed to the non-profit of the winner's choice. I work for a non-profit organization, Family First, as director of their motherhood program, called iMOM. And I am acutely aware of the demand for our services and the never-high-enough supply of funds. Amazingly and thankfully, I won $10,000!


That $10,000 equates to 100 iMOM Morning program kits to be provided for free to 100 more schools. iMOM Morning is a program which provides an opportunity for moms and kids to get together once a month for breakfast at their child's school. The event includes lively discussion on topics relevant to school age children, fun bonding activities, and provides moms with valuable parenting tips they can take home and put to use immediately.


I am impressed that Kenneth Cole created a sweepstakes to create awareness of more than just fashion. I am also very thankful for the money, which I will have the privilege of seeing joyfully spent to impact the lives of mothers and their children everywhere.

What's Eating Dambisa Moyo?


Dambisa Moyo has a point. The way in which she makes her point, however, rankles. The Zambian-born economist and author of Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa has stirred up controversy by attacking the chic celebritification of Africa.


Moyo can only be properly described as the classic Type A personality. With degrees from Harvard and Oxford and time served at Goldman Sachs, Moyo is an almost unnaturally driven advocate of the pull-yourself-up-by-your-own-bootstraps approach. Unfortunately -- or, perhaps, fortunately -- Moyo holds everyone to the same standards in which she runs her life. Many Sub-Saharan governments lean, almost grotesquely, on the crutch of short-term foreign aid to provide for the people, overlooking, in the process, long-term bets like investing in education of the young and infrastructural spending. Of course, that hard rhetoric dovetails perfectly into the Steve Forbes crowd (Africanophile Forbes smarmily blurbed her book). The result: Forbes magazine -- which could care less about African advancement -- and Moyo are on the same side of the aisle, speaking in the same voice.


Dambisa Moyo's argument ought to be heard. For too long -- decades, in fact -- the other side has dominated, and the results have been thin considering the vast amounts of moneies from Europe and America. "With aid-based models," she said on Fareed Zakaria's "GPS" this week, "you will never get a situation where governments provide innovative solutions to problems." Clearly the ultra-capitalistic tough love approach has worked for the particular temperament of Moyo, but -- and this is the $64,000 question -- Would it work for Sub-Saharan Africa? Can we take that risk? Can we not?

Troy Davis, an Innocent on Death Row

In 1991, a 23-year-old man was convicted of killing a police officer in Georgia and sentenced to death. For the past 18 years efforts have mounted to exonerate Troy Davis as evidence has come to light that all but proves his innocence. On May 19th, a "a global day of action" inspired protests around the country and raised awareness about his cause.


Amnesty International reports that seven of the nine witnesses have recanted or changed their statements, and jurors on the case have also expressed concern about the fairness behind the verdict.


On June 29th, the United States Supreme Court postponed any further action until September, when the Court will return from summer vacation.


That leaves two months to produce enough evidence to free Davis, and while he will never regain the 18 years he's spent on death row, at least he'll still be alive.


Uganda's First Baby Rhino In Decades!


I was born in Uganda years ago (I won't say how many). The country has been through a lot. My family emigrated to the United States as Idi Amin's bloodthirsty regime imploded in the late '70s. There was civil war afterwards. Hundreds of thousands of Ugandans died as a result. Since 1986, however, President Museveni has brought peace and stability as well as relatively democratic multiparty elections. The press is free. And during the 1990s, per capita income growth averaged 3.2 for the decade (6.9% per annum). Good times.


Although I am not a superstitious person by nature, I take it as a good omen that the first rhino calf was born in Uganda in two decades. The value of rhinoceros horns caused poachers -- unchecked during the civil wars -- to run wild, decimating, in the process, the native population of that majestic animal. The present Ugandan rhino population -- six -- is a sign that things are looking perhaps up for "the pearl of Africa." They have not been able to determine the sex of the calf as of yet. "The calf is three days old, but the mother is too protective. So, it is difficult to get close to them to establish its gender," Angie Genade, the executive director of Rhino Fund Uganda told NewVision.co.uk. Word is that it will be named Barack if it is a male and Michelle if it is a female. How's that for good old American soft power?

Jackson Mania Again, and This Time it's About the Music

ap_michael_jackson_070130_ssh.jpgIn the two weeks since Michael Jackson died, I've felt like I'm living in a movie for which he alone did the soundtrack. Everywhere I go, I'm surrounded by the infectious, timeless beats of "Billy Jean," "Thriller," "Man in the Mirror" and "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough."


An open apartment window, a car driving by, the sound system at a bar or cafe. The King of Pop is the man of the moment, reminding me of when he ascended to stardom in the first place, when everyone seemed to know and love his songs and you could hear them wherever you went. But this time around, his ubiquity strikes a different chord: it's like a triumphant rebuke to all the scandals that came to define his life over the past 20 years.


In death, as in his youth, Michael Jackson is finally loved again. People who might have dismissed him as a freak three weeks ago are now listening to him with fond memories of when they, too, were die-hard fans. And those who grew up after he'd become more of a tabloid fixture than a musical icon are finally getting to see (and hear) the origins of Michael Jackson's unrivaled celebrity.


Michael Jackson will be remembered the way people choose to remember him, not by the way the media reports on his debts, his alleged child molestation, his whitening face, or even how he died. And the memories will go beyond the media spectacle that took place on Tuesday morning in Los Angeles, which has caused no small amount of debate.


From what I've been hearing all over town, Michael Jackson is being remembered by what made him great. And that is, quite literally, music to my ears.


[Image: Michael Jackson performing at the Superbowl in 1993]