Higher Ground 4 Humanity

Greetings, everyone --

Time for a guest piece from The Scallion, Dot Calm's sometimes webmeister and always engineer-daughter.

Why now? I went to a seminar this weekend (11-11-11)   and had my mind blown.

Ever heard of Higher Ground 4 Humanity?

OK, ever heard of Jewel?

Geek that I am, I confess that I've heard but never paid much attention to the name  Jewel.  I vaguely suspected that she's a famous singer. Other than that, I knew (and suspected) nothing about her. Found out this weekend that her mother is Lenedra Carroll, who presented a segment during the seminar I attended. The segment Ms. Carroll presented was about the public charity she founded with daughter Jewel and son Shane: it's called Higher Ground 4 Humanity (aka HGH).

Ed: Jewel is a lovely young Country Western artist. Her beautiful home in Nashville was featured last Christmas showing the fabulous, over-the-top decorations.

What HGH is doing is so very important to the present and future of humanity that I felt compelled to share it with you. For example, if you go to Ms. Carroll's website, you can read about The Clearwater Project:

Ms. Carroll cofounded the public charity, Higher Ground 4 Humanity, with her daughter, Jewel, and son, Shane Kilcher. The ClearWater Project, a program of Higher Ground 4 Humanity, works to bring about positive change for millions around the globe suffering from lack of clean drinking water by providing relief in the form of simple and affordable technologies for making contaminated water safe for drinking.

In addition, the project provides education and awareness programs, and other initiatives.

Founded in 1998, The ClearWater Project is now active in 18 countries around the world including Tibet, Honduras, Mexico, India, the United States and Africa.

In 2006, Ms. Carroll turned The ClearWater Project, recently renamed Project Clean Water, over to Shane and Jewel.

HGH also sends life-giving support to AIDS patients in Africa. For roughly $30 dollars a month, each one of us who can afford it can literally save a life. How important is that?!

For more information, check out http://www.lenedracarroll.com/higherground4humanity.html or Google  higher ground lenedra carroll.  You'll be glad you did.

And if you choose to support HGH, someone in Africa who needs your help will be glad you did, too.

Even if she weren’t my kid, isn’t she great?

Dorli Rainey becomes unlikely face of the Occupy movement.

Photo: AP Photo/seattlepi.com, Joshua Trujillo

Seattle activist Dorli Rainey, 84, reacts after being hit with pepper spray during an Occupy Seattle protest.

A graphic photo of the former teacher after she was hit with the chemical irritant went viral, becoming one of the most striking images from the protests that have taken place in cities across the globe.

"It's a gruesome picture, I'm really not that bad looking," Rainey said in an interview Wednesday with The Associated Press.

The photograph shows Rainey, wearing a scarf and jacket, being helped by two people. One man is cradling her head in his arms as they walk away from the area.