Normally I would never post anything anywhere on line seeking any sort of financial assistance of any kind - ever.
If you would see such a post from this account you can rest assured it's been hacked.
I am doing OK and have a real personal issue with asking others for help.
This is different.
There is a man I have worked with for about 3 years. He is in his 60's and he has just recently been diagnosed with lung and stomach cancers. He has been given a year and a half or less to live.
Please make the jump if you might be interested in the story or what I would like to do for this person to improve the quality of his remaining days.
My client's name is "Jim". He's given me verbal permission to do this.
Jim has suffered with schizophrenia his entire adult life. he tried to make it all work when he was younger but this is Georgia and mental health care has been positively Medieval here for the longest time and he had the misfortune to suffer this illness during the darkest times in Georgia's mental health history.
Things are better now, though it remains a fight to get a person quality mental health care. You don't have to go that far in Georgia - even in Atlanta - to find some throwback who thinks people with schizophrenia - and even diabetes - don't need medication: they just need Jeeeeeeeesus. Maybe they need an exorcism: that's still a popular option for the unknowing.
Anyway, Jim was a guitar player in addition to whatever else he had attempted to do in life before he was totally taken over by symptoms of schizophrenia. He was eventually placed in personal care homes so he could be cared for 'better'.
He described playing the guitar earlier in life; reports he had a band or attempted to do so (all us guitar players do)
Long story short he lived in one up in the north part of Georgia and somebody stole his only guitar. This was years ago.
As is the case for most people with severe mental illness, family member - even those who love them - get to a point where they feel certain things just aren't important for people. As long as they have a clean bed and warm meal, that's somehow good enough. They stop thinking folks can still benefit from things like 'recreation" or "creativity". They write this off.
Recently Jim was diagnosed with 2 different cancers. He has been coughing, which was odd, but he was also becoming irritable and snapping at people, which is utterly out of character for him.
VIOLA: cancer diagnosis.
He has been given, so I am told, about 6 months to 18 months to live.
I have a serious level of frustration with these care homes. They get away with heinous crap while charging very sick people 95% of their SSDI checks and such. It's one abusive, exploitive event after another.
Jim's current PCH is OK, he seems reasonably happy there. But he has no guitar, still and I have decided I want to fix that AND I thought that I would share this mission with Daily Kos.
I was going to post this last week, but I decided I needed to follow up with Jim to make sure that he truly is a guitarist, and that his discussion of guitar wasn't delusional. I took my guitar to work on Monday and hauled Jim into my office. I asked him about his guitar history and then opened up my guitar case.
When he saw the guitar his face, usually drawn and staring at the floor, brightened the whole room. I handed it to him and he took ahold of it competently, cradled in his lap and went right into finger-picking something in E. It was amazing to see.
His hands bent around the neck in a way that told me they had done this for many, many years. We talked about how we get all rusty and how some practice makes it all come back.
I want Jim to have a guitar for the rest of his time on this plane and I have an inkling that there may be a couple people that might want to assist in this.
I have posted this story to see if there would be any interested people who might want to be some part of this little project. I would be seeking one of the following arrangements:
(A) have or know of a basic acoustic (box) guitar in fair and playable condition they or the owner might want to donate to Jim.
or
(B) to see if a couple/3 kossacks would be willing to send me just a few dollars each which I would take to a store to get him an appropriate guitar or (C) some other arrangement I could not foresee. I would put a little money in on this route.
I cannot afford to just give the man a guitar AND I thought there would be some folks here who would enjoy helping out.
IF one is interested in any of this, please kosmail me your interest.
I do NOT want lots of offers so if I do not respond to your kosmail, I have had more than enough follow-up. I will eventually get around to thanking you, though.
If and when this is accomplished I will 'try' to get the moment he is given the guitar on tape to share it: no promises as this is still mental health and I'd be doing this at work. I am certain I would at least get appropriate pix.
Let me know what you think: bright ideas are welcome (I have a gift for making certain things far more difficult than necessary).
PLEASE.....Kosmail me if you have a desire to be part of this (or other bright ideas)
Thanks!