Giving makes the world go ’round

As Black Friday overshadows Thanksgiving and morphs into Cyber Monday, as the TV bombards you with holiday season advertising for an endless supply of stuff, it would be easy to think that market forces are what make the world go ’round.

But there is another side to every community that relies on giving rather than on buying and selling, a side that values our attention and our labor as much as our dollars.

Market forces don’t fill the food bank or serve on the soup kitchen line. They don’t provide the free clinic or house the homeless. The arts organizations provide no dividend to stockholders. The Humane Society will never be listed on the Big Board. The volunteer fire department and the rescue squad and the public library have no corporate HQ.

There are over 2000 small not-for-profits and charitable organizations throughout the NCPR listening area that provide the glue that helps all our places to remain fit places where people can live.

While every day provides opportunities for giving–of time, of money, of care–the same can be said of buying and selling. But this time of year especially has become so commercialized in recent years that a little pause, a much-needed interruption in the flow of business as usual is called for.

That day is today–Giving Tuesday.

It’s a day to take stock, to take a deep breath, and to give back. Give a little, give a lot, give to one, give to many, give time, give goods, give whatever you can–but give.

That way you can add your own force to that of all the helpers who together make the world go ’round.

To all of our fellow non-profit organizations and the people who support them – Thank you!

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