Every now and then, something you read trickles down to your actual life and it changes the way you think, even the way you live. Something stirs in your soul and reawakens you to something you believed all along.

Good words capture the power behind the action and get it right.

They open you up to new possibilities and remind you that one person can indeed make a great difference in the world, and a few can do even more. Like all great dreams, this one started in the heart of one person, Chris Marlow and like a tumbleweed on fire, that one dream spread to others and they made it their dream too.

And I would never have known about any of this without my friend and fellow blogger, Duane Scott. He was a member of the blogger team that was going there. Oh, I knew about Haiti and the terrible earthquake that happened but like everything else we hear about in the news, it gets sandwiched, stacked on top of every other catastrophe until they all get lost in the big stack of awful stuff.

It all leaves you feeling kind of helpless and like it’s all too big, too futile.

I followed the chronicles of the Haiti blogger team eagerly. When they all boarded the plane, I almost felt like I was going with them. Then, as I read the stories, my tears splashed on the page along with theirs. It was all so much, all too big, the need too great.

I read about the Pastor and his wife who slept out in the open between the children and the child rape and the food that was never enough. And I also read about their great faith and their big smiles and I heard about the church services that went on forever because the people just couldn’t stop praising God. Hello? Something is wrong here.

Then I heard about the school they wanted to build and I learned how my little dollars could make a difference by joining Pure Charity and backing the project. When I figured out that even ten dollars can make a difference over there, I started to change how I spent here.

And now I can’t stop thinking about that school, that playground, and those kids out there playing in the bright Haitian sun.  I think of how my niece doesn’t have any kids to play with after school and I think of how much all those children would love to play with her and she with them.

And I can’t get that particular vision out of my head. Why are things so uneven? My niece is special needs and sometimes other kids aren’t sure how to play with her, but I know those kids would because they have special needs of their own…..which one of us doesn’t?

I was raised to be grateful for what I have, and I am a person who has always been mindful about the plight of the poor. I send a check each month to my sponsored child through World Vision along with my prayers, which can never do enough.

And I never lay my head on my pillow at night without thanking God for my bed. I ask myself why they were born there and me here, with so much. And I know that just thanking God is not enough.

Help join me in making dreams a reality for these kids, and for your own neighborhood kids as well. Join Pure Charity and back a project today.

You won’t be sorry you did.

And to think it all started with the Haiti bloggers and their stories, and how they almost made this hobbit-like, comfort loving, safety-concious barely leaving my continent homebody want to go there.