Today was one of those special days. I am privileged to have them more than most people, and I live in the joy and beauty of them.

It all started a couple of months ago when I met a woman and her teenaged girls at the refuge. There had been terrible things happen, and they were, at first, relieved to be there. But the mum was lost in her own demons, and after a while, the two girls went to stay with a family friend, we shall call her F, who loves them dearly.

I’ve kept in contact with F and the girls. They’ve been out to the storage units a number of times, I’ve bought bits and pieces for them, and F rings me to let me know how they’re doing.  Whenever we’ve been at the storage unit, the older of the two girls, we will call her T,   always looks downcast. There are always so many clothes for her younger sister, and none for her. So the last time we were there, I told her that I would take her out clothes shopping in the school holidays.

And today was the day. When I woke up this morning, I had no idea where to take her to get what she needed. So I asked on social media, and the Aunties, as you always do, came up trumps. All really great suggestions and a good starting place that made me feel so much more confident than I had at the beginning of the day. So armed with those suggestions, I thought it best to ring her and lay out our plans, so she knew what the day would look like, and consult her on what she really wanted to get. We had a budget of $300, which due to a few kind people, went up to $650. When I told her that, she gasped audibly. And said she had a list for me. In the meantime, one of my closest friends, S, said she and her 24 yr old daughter could come with us. I thought that was a great idea, because I worried that T would be overwhelmed, and I knew that S would be a calming presence, and dilute any attention on T that could make her feel pressured.

When I went to pick T up, she was grinning from ear to ear.  Just beaming. Off we went, and she started talking. About her mum, about the lies, about how hard it is learning how to be a normal teenager. She talked about flashbacks, and seeing what kids her age should never see. She talked about crying – how she thought she cried too much. My heart was breaking and I started crying. “I don’t want you to feel sorry for me” she said. I told her I didn’t, that I was crying because I was so angry at the adults in her life who had let her down, who had fucked up so badly that she was the one who ended carrying so much pain. Fuck adults, we agreed.

We initially went to Dressmart. She’s a really tall person, with a lovely big body, and she’s so self conscious. Ashamed of her stretchmarks. We met S and went into the bra shop  – a really discomfiting place for a kid like that to be. She wanted me to talk for her, she said, and be in the cubicle with her. So I ensconsed her there, and we got the shop assistant to do T’s first bra fitting. I don’t wear bras, so I’m hopeless at all this. S, though, is an expert and she and her daughter scoured the shop for suitable bras. At last, The One was found, and we went on to the next shop.

At this stage, I was really overwhelmed by how much pain this kid is carrying and how such little things were giving her such joy. I hear so much, hold people’s hands through so much, but this kid. She got under my skin, and it felt heavy. But she? She was so excited, so ebullient, and talking! It was just a joy to see, and that carried us all through. We looked at some more shops, but everything was too small, and I could see her getting downcast again. S and C and I gave her a pep talk about body confidence, about the evils of manufacturers, and that staved it off for a while. We went into a shoe shop and found the perfect pair of shoes, in her size. And that did it. She was so happy! So joyful! And we decided it was time for some lunch, to celebrate, and to rest our feet.

Another successful shop for more shoes, and clothes, and then the one thing she really wanted – to get her ears pierced. They had been before, and had grown over, and she just wanted it so badly. Luckily chemists still do this, so I signed a consent form for her and she sat down. She was nervous about the pain  – “just do it” she exhorted the pharmacist’s assistant – but there was none. And her face. Oh my goddess, her face. She kept touching her ears, and I could tell she was feeling herself. Her beautiful self.

Kmart was our next stop, and what a stop it was. She had her list and she knew what she wanted. Socks, undies, pyjamas, tshirts, more trousers…..and shorts. We never did get those shorts, but we ended up getting most everything else on her list. She went into the changing room and came out with a new outfit on – including a denim jacket – and I just about burst into tears. Who was this girl? This happy smiling confident girl? It was her. In love with her image in a way she never had been before.

A couple more stops for a hair straightener and special sunglasses – the mirrored sort, not clear, she was very firm about it – and we were done. When I took her back to F’s home, she showed her everything we had got, and we talked a bit more. About getting her a locked diary, so that she can write some of her secrets down, about getting her some counselling, and most of all getting her glasses. She’s falling behind at school and nobody notices because she’s too nervous to tell the teachers why she can’t do the work. We’ll sort it.

Because it is very clear to me that this young woman needs all the love she can get to make up for the horrors she has endured. It won’t fix her, but maybe, just maybe, it will help her face life and whatever it holds in store for her.  Thank you for being part of that, for helping me to make sure that she’s okay, that she doesn’t, as she said to me “turn out like my Mum. I don’t want to be like her. I don’t want to make the choices she’s made.”  If love is what it takes, then I think F, and The Aunties, HER Aunties, are the ones who can make that happen.

A lot of my work is fairly pragmatic. Meeting people, meeting needs. Getting stuff for the women, for the people I work for, and with.  But the most important work is the stuff that can’t be quantified. It’s work that relies solely on hearts connecting, making meaning out of pain, loss, grief.

Today I had the privilege of meeting two people in pain, and helping them to transform that pain into love.

K and G, their child had died. K had contacted me, to offer their precious love’s toys, books, and other things that small children have lots of. We agreed to meet and I would bring M, to whom the treasure would be going.

We spoke of A, of who he was. We talked of grief, and pain. What that looked like. I told them about the Aunties – everything. How it started, where it is now, about me, and my journey. We held hands, we touched. M spoke her truth to K,  as K had spoken hers to us. Had opened up to us, and shared her A with us so generously.

After a couple of hours, our meeting ended. The stuff was transferred from one car to another, and we hugged farewell. We’ll stay in touch, because that’s what hearts do when they connect.

M and I took the stuff back to her house, and unloaded it, ready to go to it’s new home. And we talked about what had taken place. I’ll leave the rest up to M, to explain how it all felt for her, and what it meant to her.

M: “I think the main thing for today is just that feeling of being lucky. Feeling lucky to be a part of something bigger than what I thought it was. Not just changing lives, not just giving. It’s the other stuff. It’s that being worth it eh? Showing others that they’re worth it.  But watching a lady who’s already gone through a lot of stuff open up to strangers, and possibly walking away from it feeling a lot better than what she felt when she was packing those things away the other day. She talked about that, and that touched a nerve for me. Another little child is going to play with those toys the way he played with them, with absolute joy and….I’m just looking at it, and I’m thinking – holy crap! It reinforces that good people are out there, especially when there’s been so much bad that’s happened to you. You see some good things? You start to revitalise that hope. Such a beautiful feeling.  Taking a bad situation and turning it around. Not a bad situation but a grief. All that pain. And I know that she’s definitely in a different space, from her own giving. Pass it on, I reckon.”

Yeah, M. We just keeping passing it on. Love, beauty, and our hearts. Hope lives.

At the end of every year, I do a blog thanking everyone who’s helped us out during the year – the donors of money and clothes, the people who’ve helped with Refuge Xmas, the people who support me and keep me going. The Uber Aunties. The people who go above and beyond, who are hugely invested with this work that  you and I do.

I’m doing this one today, however, because I think it’s called for. Social media is a really piecemeal way of raising awareness and funds. I’ve said this many times before. People may share your posts, retweet, whatever they do, and that’s called reach. What reach doesn’t do, however, is always connect your work to the people who will give, who will invest in the women, with money, in particular. I know that some businesses see twitter and FB as this magic thing – it’s not. Believe me.  It does, indeed, give you reach. But it doesn’t do the work for you. You still have to do that. You still have to put in the time and effort to initiate and maintain relationships. And that’s what this is all about. It bears repeating: to build any sort of sustainability, you need a good base of support. And you build that support over years of relationship, by putting the hard yards – and lots of hugs – in.

Twitter is the core of the Aunties work. It’s where it started, it’s where all my Uber Aunties come from. People who became really invested in this work, in the women. Some are regular and generous donors of time and money, some are on the Aunties Board (all of them met via Twitter), and some send me messages of support. Email me to tell me their stories. Have become friends and allies. Stand up for me when somebody’s being a dick (which doesn’t happen very often, I have to say).

And Facebook has just opened up the Auntie’s world. We now recieve the majority of our donations using that page, and I have met so many wonderful people. Some will give once, and some give all the time. It doesn’t matter, really. It all helps. It is all about relationship. I believe it’s called “casting the net widely”.

So where is this all leading? To gratitude.

In the middle of last week, I had a really unpleasant exchange with this guy. All because I tweeted something he found offensive. And so he said something about foul mouthed people and their morals, and that I was likely laundering the Aunties money. Which I find so offensive. The very idea of it makes me feel sick, that anyone would believe anything like that. So I let him know that I don’t get paid, as yet, for this work. And then he came back with a smart comment, making a joke of homeless people. So I let rip, and then I blocked him, and had another few smart comments to say, and that was it for me.

However, the good citizens of Twitter hadn’t finished with him, and stuck up for me. Hurrah! But even better, they flocked to put money on the Givealittle page. Which was somewhat astonishing. I found it hilarious. And it kept me chuckling for a good long while (until the givealittle people rang me and told me that people were saying fuck on the GAL page, and it wasn’t cool).  And more than that, over $3000 was donated. Which is, quite frankly, OUTRAGEOUS. Now, that was good enough. That was more than good enough. But I know that that payment won’t come into the Aunties bank account till the 20th of this month, and Kris wants to take the kids and women on a trip to Butterfly Creek, so I knew that to do that, I would actually have to raise some MORE money, but this time have it put in the bank account so it was directly accessible.

Onto FB I went, with my begging letter. I hate doing it. It’s the worst part of this job, it really really is. But it needed to be done if the trip was to happen, and the expenses for the next few weeks were to be paid. So I did that. And once again, it happened. This time, $1500 where it needed to be.

And so to the point of this blog post. I have a huge amount of gratitude and love for you all anyway. I am enabled to do what I love most in the world because you keep the stuff, the money, and the support flowing in. But I am truly in your debt for the actions of the last few days. Truly. The financial side of this is always a bit of a balancing act – if it were up to me the girls in the refuge would have what they wanted, when they wanted it. There are a couple of people who keep me real on the need not to do that, and go overboard, and there’s also not ever enough money to do that. Because everything that comes in, comes from you. The Aunties. That’s your job, but if you didn’t do it, I would be up the creek without a paddle. I’d be trying to paddle with my hands, and the canoe would be slowly sinking. Not to put too fine a point on that particular metaphor. We don’t get funding or grants, as yet, for anything. And I also happen to think that the being able to donate directly to the women is a really big reason that people feel engaged with the work. Feel connected to the women.

So thank you. Thank you to: Richie, Jessica, Patrice, Anastasia, Morgan, Liz, Katrina, Rosie, Grace, Courtney, Eleanor, Stuart, Ruth, Suzanne, Lee, Heath, Nicola, AJ, Chrissie, Sarah, Anthea, Jane, Anne, Josh, Matt, Katie, Sam, Julia, Kris, Bryan, Gary, Jacinta, Alex, Hannah, Bronwen, Kelly, Kerry, Iris, Cathy, Andrew, Brenda, Linda, Sonia, Amanda, Julie, Emma, Claire, Jen, Carolyn, Kerry, Janet, Karlo, Rachel and Dan, and Jenni. To all the people from FB whose names I don’t know – sorry! And thank you so much.

Thank you for your love, support, and caring. Thank you for your faith, and trust, in me, Thank you for your belief in this work, and your commitment to people you will likely never meet. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. This was a mid year miracle that needed to happen – you have no idea how much of a boost it gave the coffers but also how much it boosted me. I’m lucky – every day I get to see good people doing good things. But in the last few days, what you all did was extraordinary. I hope you know how much it means. And if I ever meet you, if I haven’t already, I will be, if you’re okay with it, be giving you a really big hug (and crying, I do crying really well).

If you put money in the bank account, and would like a receipt please email our treasurer, Elaine, at elaine.j@slingshot.co.nz and she will do that for you.

Once again. Thank you. I love your work.