November 26, 2017: Creative Growth
I wrote this post before all the excitement of this weekend following Andrew’s amazing proposal to share the significance of Thanksgiving to Brandon and my family. I am so grateful Andrew turned the weekend into a celebration on the eve of the most important day of the year to Brandon, and look forward to many more celebrations with friends and family to come!
10 months.
If you knew Brandon, or attended his funeral, you know of his unwavering love for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. Brandon watched the parade every single day, multiple times a day. There was nothing in the later years of his life that brought him more joy than watching it on repeat.
When we were younger, on the eve of Thanksgiving our family would pack into Brandon’s van, the “Wolfbuss,” and head to New York City to stay at a hotel along the parade route. My Dad made sure to get a hotel suite with the very best views, at the perfect viewing height to see the parade in action. We’d wake up early to see the first parade watchers arrive and begin to line up, as early as 5am. We’d order room service for breakfast and our cousins from Florida and New York would join us as we all crowded around the windows to watch the magic unfold as each float passed by, until the parade concluded with the grand finale, Santa’s sleigh.
As it became more difficult for Brandon to stay over in the city, my “do-whatever-it-takes” Dad decided he was going to bring the parade to our house instead. Down to the very last detail — my dad recreated the magic we felt watching the parade from our hotel room, only a few feet away from the action, right in the heart of Brandon’s bedroom. Him and Brandon would take breakfast orders from our extended family to ensure there was still “room service.” To bring some friendly competition into the mix, Brandon would have our family members guess two details about the year’s parade: what the temperature would be in Central Park at exactly 9am when the parade kicked off, and exactly what Al Roker, one of the hosts, would be wearing. Brandon would go to Party City to pick out the balloons in the parade — from Spiderman to Shrek and Hello Kitty, and display them throughout his room and around our house. With the parade playing on both flat screen TVs in his room, turned out to be even more special than being in that cramped hotel room. As an aside, Brandon would also setup a similar party at his office for all his co-workers on the day before Thanksgiving as well.
Brandon’s favorite part of the parade (and the one he made us watch on repeat whenever we were home) was the official ribbon cutting ceremony. At the parade kickoff, my Dad always ensured we had all of the right props: an official red ribbon to cut, a bottle of champagne to open, and confetti poppers for each one of us to pop after our 10-second countdown in tandem with the live parade. It was pure magic that Brandon created and gifted us, without ever uttering a word.
It won’t come as a surprise that when it wasn’t Thanksgiving, Brandon learned everything there was to know about the parade. He knew of its origins and older traditions, like the fact that they used to release the balloons at the end of the parade, and reward those who found the floats with cash prizes. He knew the key players, like Amy Kule, the leader of the parade, who, as fate would have it, did not lead the parade this year for the first time in 7 years. Not to mention, in order to get in Brandon’s good graces, Andrew was expected to answer trivia questions related to the parade, which always made Brandon laugh as Andrew tried to figure out the answers.
Above all else, Brandon would learn about what the new floats were going to be in the parade each year, and worked with his special nurse, Lee, to create replicas of each float and display them along the route in NYC. This year to carry on the tradition and honor his Uncle Brandon’s legacy, my nephew Chase worked with Lee to create this year’s new additions.
I’ll never know for certain what sparked Brandon’s immense love for the parade, but I know at the heart of it, it was our family coming together to just celebrate the moment, just as we did this weekend.
Method + Creative Growth
In honor of Brandon’s love for the parade, and particularly related to his own artwork in re-creating the parade floats, I am writing this month about a for-profit and non-profit partnership I recently learned about from a Ross alumnus at the Center for Positive Organizations. Hank Mercier, Chief Optimist (aka VP of Sales) at People Against Dirty, the company that creates Method soap, spoke about his company’s partnership with an amazing non-profit, Creative Growth, as a positive business practice.
Creative Growth is a non-profit based in California that serves artists with developmental, mental, and physical disabilities, providing a professional studio environment for artistic development, gallery exhibition and representation, and a social atmosphere among peers.
I was incredibly inspired by the Method + Creative Growth partnership through this amazing video Hank shared, and I hope you take a few minutes to watch and learn about:
Please join me this Giving Tuesday donating through the link on my Facebook page, buying a Creative Growth + Method soap at Target, or just learning more through the links below:
As always, if you know of any for-profit or non-profit organizations supporting the community of individuals with disabilities, please reach out and let me know.
Thank you for taking the time to read this — I wish you a wonderful holiday season ahead and hope that you carry Brandon’s special spirit with you in Thanksgivings to come.
