Community Matters

This Jay Leno thing has me on the verge of tears. Jay Leno is putting on a free show for out-of-work Detroiters in April. Tickets were available starting this morning, and were gone by 11:00am. So Jay announced a second show the following day.

The thing that I find so moving about this is the fact that Jay billed this from the beginning as Jay's Stimulus package. It was offered to the unemployed of Detroit. I know Jay is an avid collector of bikes and automobiles and can only assume that this is his way of giving back to the people that make the motors he loves.

But aside from the Leno's commitment are the other stories. The actual stories of the people in line. People that woke up to go stand in line for tickets, because they no longer had jobs to wake up for, all in an effort to live on, to still provide something for their families, even if it is a free comedy show to lighten the burdens of the times.

Then there are the other stories. Domino's Pizza, a Michigan company, offered free pizza to people in line, delivered by the sexy Piston's dance team. Pepsi is providing free soda (I mean "pop") during the event. Parking is free, everything is free.

Finally something good for the city. While this is a relatively small, isolated event it is just an example of a community coming together, not to solve the problem, but to just pick each other up, for a moment, and forget about how tough life is right now.

Photo from the Detroit Free Press