What’s Up? with Merlene

Phyllis Jenness, 87, doesn’t tell herself no.
“I’ve never heard anyone say it that way before, but I appreciate hearing it,” she said.
The retired University of Kentucky voice professor sees a challenge or a new opportunity and goes for it. And we in Lexington are far better for that.
Jenness retired from UK in 1993 but hasn’t taken the sit-back-and-relax part of retirement very seriously.
“After I retired I had a yen to do something that wasn’t music related, because I had done music all my life,” she said.

Phyllis Jenness - photos by Stephanie Lyell

So she took up golf. But she wasn’t as good at it as she was devoted to it. She taught adults to read through Operation Read. When they needed an English as a second language teacher, she volunteered.
Her students were Russian immigrants, prompting a desire to learn their language and culture to teach them better.
“I was a terrible, terrible Russian student,” Jenness said. “I could pronounce it, so I could sing Russian songs. But as far as learning the language, I was a dud.”
However, through her Russian teacher, Jenness became involved with InterCultural Connections, Inc., a non-profit service organization that originally helped children in Russia but now helps children in distressed communities in the Bluegrass and around the world, particularly Guatemala.
To help raise money for the organization, Jenness decided to offer voice lessons, “thinking they would never want that.” But they did. In 2004, Jenness started “Be a Better Singer” voice classes, which still meet on Sundays, with proceeds benefiting InterCultural Connections.
Glenna Graves, president of InterCultural Connections, said Jenness’s contributions have paid for scholarships to the YMCA for young people in Georgetown as well as sending thousands of books to Thailand and three ambulances to Guatemala.
In Escuintla, residents celebrate “Projecto Phyllis Jenness,” a truck with an attached water tank that has been a huge blessing to the residents of that small Guatemalan community.
Graves said 99 percent of the non-profit’s budget, or several thousand dollars annually, is from Jenness and the money she makes teaching.
“She thinks everyone can learn to sing,” said Janet Friedell, 79, who attended the first class Jenness taught in 2004. “She gets us to actually stand in front of the class and perform a song, something I never dreamed I would do.”
Judith Lesnaw, 69, also a charter group member, said Jenness criticizes gently and always encourages her students. “Never once, no matter how unprepared we are or how we creak, squeak and squawk, have I ever heard a disparaging word. She uses our incredible blunders to make us feel good and teach something.”
The Sunday class meets at 3 p.m. at Temple Adath Israel, 124 South Ashland Ave. It’s reached its limit for participants, but Jenness recently agreed to teach another voice class, this one on Saturdays, to all-comers, regardless of ability. Proceeds from those classes will benefit Hope for Tomorrow Children’s Home, an orphanage in Guatemala.
Again, the proceeds will buy diapers, medicine, food, clothing and provide for 24-hour staffing for the home, which currently houses eight children.
Brenda Riddle is executive director of Adopt!inc., a Lexington adoption agency that facilitates both domestic and international adoptions and that has acquired Hope for Tomorrow.
Jenness “is a fabulous example of someone who is incredibly giving,” Riddle said. “And what a creative and innovative way to help children in another country. She is incredibly kind.”
The new Saturday classes started four weeks ago, and like those on Sunday, cost $30 a month. A permanent location is being worked out.
But what about rest for the retiree?
“It’s such a satisfaction to me that at this point in my life I am being useful and helping the students but also helping people who need the money,” Jenness said. “It’s better than sitting around and watching TV.”
That she will never do.
Born in Natick, Mass., Jenness sang at school, in church and in college, where she was a featured soloist, “so I was led to believe I was a real hotshot,” she said.
Jenness earned her undergraduate degree and taught math, science and chemistry in schools before following her dream. She spent several years in New York City, making a living with her voice, but not achieving the level of success she had hoped for. She registered with a Chicago employment agency and was surprised to get a call from UK in August 1954.
“I had done almost no teaching,” Jenness said. “I don’t think I lied about it, but I think somehow they thought I had done more.
“I hadn’t been here a month before I knew I had found my profession and my place,” she said.
And she has been good for Lexington and UK. She primarily taught vocals, but she dabbled in vocal literature and choral conducting, all the while performing.
She established UK’s opera program in 1955 and founded the Lexington Singers in 1958. She led that group for nearly 20 years.
“I had never done any choral conducting, but somehow I thought I’d like to do this,” she said.
The Singers are still going strong.
And now she teaches voice to ordinary people.
“I try to see more in life than doing what I have to do, meeting my schedule and washing the dishes,” she said.
The Sunday class has 24 students ranging in age from teens to those in their 70s or 80s. An hour before the voice classes she offers a sight reading class for $10 a month.
“I get great satisfaction in working with a singer no matter who they are, whether they are talented or not, and hearing the voice become healthier and more usable and more pleasant and etc.
“The teaching part has always been so stimulating to me and continues to be.”

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Be a Better Singer
Phyllis Jenness teaches a voice class at 11 a.m., on Saturday for all ages and all talent levels. The cost is $30 a month. Contact ­Jenness at (859) 269-5451

I’m not sure if my father was drafted into the Army in World War II or if he enlisted. But one thing I’m sure of is that he looked back on those days with a degree of frustration.
Once, during the civil rights movement, he spoke of the indignity he felt knowing this country would allow a German, an enemy this country had fought, to buy a house in a white neighborhood when he couldn’t.
My father didn’t dwell on it. It was the law of the land.
But it was hurtful to the patriot in him to have his country disrespect him that way.
I mention that to remind all of us that there was a time when black soldiers weren’t appreciated by their country, by politicians or even by their fellow soldiers any more than gay soldiers are today.
They were accused of cowardice, of being less intelligent and of being unworthy of serving shoulder-to-shoulder with white soldiers.
We all now know that to be false.
Why are we now doing the same thing to gays?
President Barack Obama is advocating the end of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” military policy that prohibits asking about a soldier’s sexual preferences. If a gay or lesbian soldier was discovered somehow, however, he or she would be asked to voluntarily leave the military or be discharged.
All because the soldier is homosexual, as if that is an indicator of his or her patriotism or bravery.
Adm. Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Congress this week that the policy should be repealed.
“No matter how I look at the issue, I cannot escape being troubled by the fact that we have in place a policy which forces young men and women to lie about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens,” Mullen said.
That blew my mind.
From what I’ve heard on talk radio and on various TV talk shows from those who oppose repealing the policy, having openly gay soldiers in the military would mark the end of the best armed services in the world. Straight soldiers wouldn’t be able to concentrate on saving this country from aggression if they served next to gay ones.
Gerard Badger of Lexington, a retired sergeant who served 20 years in the Army, including two tours of duty in Vietnam, said he doesn’t understand it.
“Gays have always been in the military,” he said. “I served with them. It doesn’t make any difference to me.”
Badger said he sees a similarity in how gays are treated now and how black soldiers were treated before and during WWII. The military said blacks had poor night vision and couldn’t be gunners, Badger said, adding that some officials claimed blacks couldn’t fight at all.
Claims like that relegated some black seamen in the Navy to cleaning, cooking or shoe-shining duties.
The fact that many black soldiers distinguished themselves during the war didn’t really change a lot of opinions.
But President Harry S. Truman signed an executive order in July 1948, near the end of what appeared would be his last year in office, that stated, “It is hereby declared to be the policy of the President that there shall be equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed services without regard to race, color, religion or national origin.”
The last segregated regiment in this country was disbanded in 1954, months after the Korean War ended.
Doris Kearns Goodwin, a presidential historian, said only after black and white soldiers fought “side-by-side first in the WWII Battle of the Bulge, then in Korea” were people convinced an integrated military was possible. “Reality in the situation made it work, but people’s fears had to be overcome.”
So if gays have served in the military before, I don’t understand the problem. Badger said it is not a soldier’s sexual orientation or race that we should worry about.
“Will he back me up?” Badger said. “That’s the question. Does he have my back?”
And if gay soldiers have fought well for so many years, if they have had our backs, why don’t we have theirs?

Most college students are ineligible to seek protection orders against dating partners who turn violent. Domestic violence protection orders are limited to familial or live-in relationships, or for those who have a child together.
Taneshia House, a recent University of Kentucky graduate and a VISTA volunteer at the Violence Intervention and Prevention Center on campus, said that’s wrong.
“Most college students don’t cohabitate immediately,” she said. “Most visit each other on weekends.”
She and others who want to change domestic violence laws to include dating partners will gather in Frankfort on Wednesday, armed with several hundred signatures, in hopes of getting House Bill 73 passed.
“We’re trying to rally some students to be a physical presence there,” said Ryan Wagoner, outreach coordinator for VIP. “We want to show legislators that people are standing behind it and supporting it.”
VIP is a campus organization that deals with stalking, rape and sex assault, Wagoner said. They provide programs to teach and train students how to prevent such violence.
“We also provide service for clients who come in,” he said.
Because students have a tough time spending most of a day in Frankfort instead of in the classroom, Wagoner said, they have signed letters in support of the legislation that can be given to legislators.
HB 73, sponsored by state Rep. Mike Denham, D-Maysville, is the result of five separate bills — aimed at the state getting a tighter grip on domestic violence — rolled into one. One of those bills would prohibit joint mediation or counseling when a protection order was in place; one would add strangulation as a physical injury; one would establish a domestic violence database and in-service training for law enforcement; one would prohibit the perpetrator from voting or holding public office; and one would allow dating partners to file for domestic violence protective orders.
“Back in the ’80s, Kentucky was on the forefront of domestic violence protection,” said state Rep. Joni Jenkins, D-Louisville, who had sponsored the dating partners bill, then known as HB 30. “We sat back on our laurels a little.”
Although she has introduced the bill several times, Jenkins said, judges feared that the inclusion of dating partners would clog an overloaded court system. She said the worry was how to determine what a serious relationship is.
But 40 other states have passed similar laws with few problems, she said.
“These people pay taxes and they deserve the same kind of protection,” Jenkins said. “We tend to think of it being for very young people. But this is for all ages.
“This is a great bill,” she said. “When you intervene early, you really do change behavior. Down the road, this will be a preventative and save money.”
Sherry Currens, executive director of the Kentucky ­Domestic Violence Association, said students on a college campus who experience domestic violence are “kind of sitting ducks.”
Victims live in dorms and go to class, leaving them vulnerable to future attacks. Police can’t intervene until something else happens, she said. “Campus police have wanted this,” she said.
In the case of older dating couples, Currens said, they usually don’t live together, and stalking is hard to prove.
“It is so easy to fix,” Currens said. “If you look at other states (with the dating provision), there is no indication it will create a huge burden. It is very needed.”
The General Assembly has witnessed several bills dealing with domestic violence this session, prompted in large measure by the death of Amanda Ross allegedly by Steve Nunn, a former state legislator. Nunn has pleaded not guilty to the Sept. 11 slaying.
“I think that had a lot of push,” Jenkins said. “If you can take a tragedy and have something good come out of it, that makes it a little better.”
HB 73 will be discussed at noon in the Judiciary Committee meeting in Room 171 of the Capitol Annex.

I thought it best I didn’t eat prior to my noon appointment to interview Dr. Elizabeth Ubelhor.
The staff veterinarian for the Lexington Humane Society would be spaying or neutering animals while we discussed the virtues of surgically controlling the feral and pet animal populations. I could not imagine keeping food down while that was going on.
But, just as with many other things about Ubelhor, the anticipated is not what I got.
Ubelhor, 46, performed at least six surgeries in the 90 minutes of our interview and one of them involved the removal of a rather large cloth-like object from the intestines of a 9-month-old Labradoodle named Tina.
There were probably more, but I was so engrossed in her efficiency, her surgical skills and her compassion I forgot to count.

Dr. Liz Ubelhor

Last Thursday was a Spay’sTheWay day, an income-based, free or low-cost spay and neuter program for Fayette County pet owners.
One after another, anesthetized dogs were brought into the operating room and Ubelhor would remove their reproductive organs and suture them all within 10 minutes. When one procedure was finished, she moved to the next patient, never stopping to rest or talk. And amazingly there was very little blood.
“There is blood if you are not cutting in the right spot,” she said. “There is a learning curve. I’ve been doing this for 20 years.”
Last year, Ubelhor performed 6,812 sterilizations. She not only works at the Humane Society, but, on her days off, she travels to other counties where she alters, examines and treats feral cats in the Trap Neuter Release program, and to McCreary County, where she grew up, to conduct a low-cost clinic.
“I spent nine months at a municipal shelter euthanizing their unadoptable, unwanted animals,” Ubelhor said. “I cried and had nightmares and I swore that I would try to make it better.
“And the only way I could figure out to make it better is to spay and neuter and to make more animals wanted,” she continued. “As long as we have this huge excess, there will always be animals not wanted. So my goal, which won’t happen in my lifetime, is to make every animal want-able.”
Ubelhor and her family knew early on that she would be a veterinarian. Her goal was to build a clinic, live above it and save the world.
“We knew she would be a veterinarian from the third grade on,” said Mary Ruth Stephens, Ubelhor’s mother. “When she decided, she came home that weekend and memorized all the bones of a cat’s body. She read the encyclopedia for fun.”
Ubelhor’s mother taught for 30 years and her father, the Rev. Brent Stephens, is a Baptist minister.
“They never told me girls can’t be veterinarians,” Ubelhor said. “They said if you work hard, you can do it.”
They also told her any wild animals she brought home, such as the crayfish and salamanders, had to be released back into the wild before nightfall so they could be with their parents.
One Monday a month Ubelhor returns to McCreary County to conduct a clinic for the Animal Protection League. Her mother takes appointments and her sister volunteers as the veterinary technician.
Ubelhor charges $15 per animal to spay or neuter, clip toenails, spray with flea killer and whatever else is needed.
The clinic was open from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Ubelhor didn’t sit down once, Stephens said. She poured soup in a cup for her daughter who drank it and kept going, she said, completing 45 procedures.
“She’s too good for her own good,” Stephens said. “She gives so much of herself.”
A graduate of Eastern Kentucky University, Ubelhor applied to Auburn University’s College of Veterinarian Medicine, which takes a limited number of Kentucky residents each year. She didn’t make it in.
So she moved to Tennessee, hoping to establish residency there and apply to the College of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Tennessee.
But the next year, she was accepted at Auburn, where she really wanted to go.
There, she met a handsome bearded man from Lexington, fell in love and married him. Her husband, Dr. John G. Ubelhor, is an equine veterinarian.

Dr. Liz Ubelhor __ Photos by Pablo Alcala

Liz Ubelhor worked in private veterinarian practice for 16 years before she decided to pursue her passion of spaying and neutering animals. Eventually she joined the staff of the Humane Society.
“Certainly, my passion is for spay and neutering and trying to make the world a better place for animals,” she said, “and in the meantime making the world a better place for people, too.
“That sounds sappy. But that is the truth,” she said. “Spaying and neutering is good for everybody.”
There was a pet rat scheduled for surgery the day I interviewed Ubelhor. Thankfully, she said she’d bring it out after I was long gone.
One Saturday a month she sterilizes for Home At Last Animal Shelter in Salvisa, one Saturday a month for L.I.F.E House for Animals, Inc., in Frankfort, and one Saturday a month for the Scott County Humane Society’s Trap, Neuter and Release efforts.
“I have great like-minded people who see these animals behind Wendy’s and McDonalds and they trap them humanely and bring them to me” Ubelhor said. “I vaccinate them, spay or neuter, de-worm, give them antibiotics and take off any tumors. I realize they’ll probably never see a veterinarian again.”
After sterilizing more than 6,800 animals last year, she knows there are still more needing her services.
“My mom keeps saying ‘Surely to goodness you are going to run out of dogs and cats,’” Ubelhor said, pulling a baby tooth from a puppy. “And I say, ‘From your mouth to God’s ears, Mom.”

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February is National Spay and Neuter Month. In addition to preventing overpopulation and encouraging less stressful behavior in animals, spaying helps prevent breast cancer in female animals and neutering helps to prevent prostate cancer.
The Lexington Humane Society is offering 250 free or low cost spaying and neutering for pets of qualified Fayette County residents throughout February. Included is a free rabies vaccination, free city license and a microchip for $1. Call (859) 233-0044, ext. 228.

The good thing about youth is that there hasn’t been time for a whole lot of failure, no time to become jaded. Everything is possible with enough effort.
That’s why Emilee Brooke Fairchild of Paintsville thinks she can get folks to help find a cure for Type 1, or juvenile, diabetes by raising $100 in each ZIP code in Kentucky.
It doesn’t seem that far-fetched now that I’ve talked with Emilee.
Zip the Cure, a non-profit organization based in Pittsburgh and founded by a 15-year-old girl who has lived with the disease most of her life, has set up a Web site and established state captains to get the word out and the money coming in.
Emilee, 13, is Kentucky’s captain.
She was diagnosed with Type 1 in 2004, when she was 7. She had suffered severe headaches, and when a relative suggested testing her blood by a finger prick, her fasting blood sugar reading was 586 milligrams. Normal fasting levels are between 70 and 110.
Type 1 diabetes is a chronic disease that occurs when the pancreas doesn’t produce enough insulin to properly control blood sugar levels. It’s generally diagnosed in children, teenagers and young adults. No one knows the cause, but genetic, environmental and auto­immune factors are involved.
“My life was definitely changed,” Emilee said. “I was afraid to be away from Mom and Dad. I was afraid that if my blood sugar went too high or low, I could have a seizure or go into a coma.”
Emilee’s mother, Paula Fairchild, said the disease has hit their family hard. Paula Fairchild’s sister was diagnosed with it, as were two uncles.

Emilee Fairchild

Emilee was hospitalized several times during the first year after her diagnosis because bouts with strep throat, viruses and the accompanying lack of appetite all affected her blood sugar levels.
She required five insulin shots a day and 10 finger pricks to monitor her blood sugar.
“These steps were necessary not only to stay healthy,” Paula Fairchild said, “but to stay alive. Without insulin, she will die.”
Emilee’s parents became very protective, not allowing sleep-overs at friends’ homes and accompanying her on all field trips.
“It can be managed,” her mom said. “It just takes effort.”
And just when the family thought everything was under control, puberty struck, sending hormones and blood sugar readings out of whack.
Now Emilee has an insulin pump, which makes insulin injection easier but does not automatically regulate blood sugar levels. Friends and family help her recognize when her levels are up or down.
“A lot of my friends can tell if it’s high or low by how I’m acting,” Emilee said. “When my blood sugar is low, I’m a little shaky, disorganized and disoriented. I stare into space when it is high.”
Her mom said Emilee, a seventh-grader at Johnson County Middle School, has  carefully followed dietary requirements and restrictions because she knows she’ll be gravely ill if she doesn’t.
Although she has learned to manage the disease, ­Emilee would like to help find a cure so others won’t have to go through what she has.
That’s why she joined Zip the Cure.
The project’s goal is to collect money in each of the country’s 42,000 ZIP codes. If $100 is donated in each one, $4.2 million will be raised.
When a ZIP code is “sold,” it is marked green on a map on the organization’s Web site, www.zipthecure.com. So far, more than 110 ZIP codes have been sold in about 30 states.
Kentucky has more than 950 ZIP codes, and none have been sold, Paula Fairchild said.
We need to get moving.
A corporation, business, school, neighborhood association or individual can buy a ZIP code and help Emilee reach her goal. All proceeds benefit the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
Go to the Web site to make a donation. If you have questions, e-mail Emilee at Kentucky@zipthecure.com.
“I don’t care if I have to stand on the side of the road,” Emilee said. “I will do anything to find a cure.”

It would be understandable to assume the High Street Neighborhood Center is a place where residents of a community gather for recreation and relaxation. Understandable, but wrong.
The High Street Neighborhood Center is the name of a day care facility that was established in 1969 by women’s groups at two downtown churches to serve low-income and at-risk families in that area and in Irishtown a few blocks away.
It still does.
Now, however, it is open to all families, regardless of income.
“Our number-one ministry here is child care primarily for low-income and at-risk children,” said Whitney Schlansky, the center’s director since 2001. “But as for diversity, you won’t find any place more diverse.”
Schlansky said some of the children who attend are foster children, some are in the care of grandparents, some come from single-parent homes and some from traditional families.

Whitney Schlansky

They are the children of university students and of refugees. Some have a parent living in a spouse-abuse shelter and some have a parent enrolled in a program at Chrysalis House. Some are Muslim and some Christian.
The faith-based, non-profit center is licensed to care for 60 children, ranging in age from 12 months to 5 years. Schlansky said she keeps about four of those slots open for children who need emergency child care.
“We were serving the very poor before, but we changed our mission statement,” Schlansky said. “We focus more on families that don’t qualify for (government) child-care assistance and who don’t make enough (to pay full price) for child care” themselves.
All parents must either be students or employed, and there is a waiting list.
Usually those who are employed have some extenuating circumstances, she said, that keeps them from getting ahead. “We feel like we keep the working man working,” she said.
Until the downturn in the economy, the center managed to provide those services with the continued support of Calvary Baptist Church and First United Methodist Church, grants and private donations.
But funding has slowed and the center is running on a deficit, she said.
Foundations have a smaller pool of money and a larger number of outstretched hands needing it. “People are just not able to give as much as they have in the past,” Schlansky said.
“Normally, the center gives out $48,000 in scholarships to parents annually,” she said, “but I have more parents who need scholarships than we have money.”
There will be a tuition increase in March, but not all the parents will be able to pay that increase. For 1- and 2-year-olds, the tuition will be $125 a week. For 3- to 5-year-olds, the tuition will be $110 a week.
Schlansky is hoping some of you will be able to help.
She’d like individuals or companies to help pay the scholarships of one or more of the children. Some scholarships are as low as $10 a week and some go as high as $75 a week or more. The donor can pay a week’s worth, a month’s worth or for a whole year.
“I can write a grant for crayons and markers and get it,” Schlansky said. “But those are restricted funds.”
Scholarships help people like Agnes Spencer, who has custody of her niece, 4.
“Her parents gave her to me,” Spencer said. “I was scared to death. My three kids are grown. I didn’t think I could raise another one.”
Spencer said she received child-care assistance for six months but then was left to pay it own her own. “It came to the point where I thought I would have to take her out.”
She said she didn’t want her niece to leave that nurturing environment, and when she heard about the scholarships, she broke down and cried.
“She will be there until she goes to school,” Spencer said. “Each teacher is like a friend, and they’re there for you no matter what.”
The children also receive computer training once a month and music lessons once a week from volunteers.
And the center does that while being one of the best kept secrets in Lexington.
“We have zero dollars in our advertising budget and I’m very proud of that,” Schlansky said. “It keeps our teachers accountable. It is all word-of-mouth.
“If you are happy here, you are going to tell 10 people,” she said. “That has kept us full.”
Word-of-mouth is how O’Kescha Wilson found the High Street Center for her 3-year-old son.
A family member whose daughter had attended the center told Wilson about it. That daughter is now 24, but the mother still remembers.
Wilson likes the family atmosphere at the center and how her son gets to interact with children from different countries.
At one time, Wilson said, she lost her job for two months and had to withdraw her son from the center. “They called and checked on us to make sure we were OK,” Wilson said. “If my son was sick, they would call and check on him. You don’t worry when it is more like a family.”
Now she too tells anyone looking for day care about High Street.
Schlansky is hoping you will make it possible for the center to help other families like the Spencers and Wilsons as they try to help themselves.
If you can help out even a little, give Schlansky a call at (859) 233-1654.

I was looking over the schedule for the 41st annual NAACP Image Awards — which airs at 8 p.m., Feb. 26 on FOX — imagining myself getting all dressed up and walking down the red carpet while batting my eyes as cameras cemented my every move for history.
OK, maybe not.
I’ve always been interested in what the women wear at those gala events.
While checking out the Web site, I perused some of the award nominees and gasped.
Someone in his or her infinite wisdom had nominated Bravo’s The Real Housewives of Atlanta for an image award in the reality TV category.
The Real Housewives of Atlanta? Come on, now. What kind of image is the NAACP trying to reward?
Confession time: I watched every episode of the Atlanta housewives during the program’s first season, marveling at how different life was for the financially blessed. I had watched bits and pieces of The Real Housewives of Orange County and The Real Housewives of New York, but the Atlanta version was the first to feature black folk, and it is the most popular one in the series.
I couldn’t get enough.
The women have various personalities ranging from ­saditty (or stuck-up) to innocent to wannabe and straight-shooting.
I don’t remember if my daughter turned me on to the program or if my aunt did because my cousin was featured on one episode as a skilled cake decorator.
At any rate, I watched it and loved it. Couldn’t wait for this season to start.
But from the first episode until the third or fourth this season, the main theme seemed to be just how mean and nasty the women could be. I turned it off.
I didn’t see any of that as behavior to emulate.
Isn’t that what an image award is for?
It says on the Image Awards Web site that “the NAACP Image Awards is the nation’s premier event celebrating the outstanding achievements and performances of people of color in the arts as well as those individuals or groups who promote social justice.”
What is so outstanding about women cursing, back-stabbing, gossiping and pulling at one another’s wigs? One woman wasn’t the least bit remorseful about having an affair with a married man.
Another woman, the one who actually attended church, realized her mistake after watching herself on the first season and declined to return for a second.
Come on, now. It was like watching mean middle school girls, only these were grown women who should have known better.
“Ideas and images create the belief systems that control our individual and societal actions,” according to the Web site. “When it comes to forming ideas, reinforcing stereotypes, establishing norms and shaping our thinking nothing affects us more than the images and concepts delivered into our lives on a daily basis by television, motion picture, recordings and literature.”
Exactly.
I tried to find an NAACP representative to comment but was unsuccessful. One member, who referred me to the state chapter, said mine wasn’t the first complaint about the selection.
I also called the national offices, which referred me to the Hollywood offices, which referred me to voice mail.
Before referring me to an answering machine, a woman in the Hollywood offices said some 300 people selected the five finalists in each category. Some of the people are in the entertainment field and some are not, she said.
Publicists, managers, artists, studios and networks, among others send in nominees and those 300 people selected the best five in each of 53 categories.
So under “Outstanding Reality Series,” the five best programs were: American Idol; America’s Next Top Model; Dancing with the Stars; Extreme Makeover: Home Edition; and Real Housewives of Atlanta.
That last entry was a big mistake. How embarrassing. People in Atlanta diss that program. There is nothing about the Atlanta housewives that presents a positive image.
Only members of the NAACP can vote, so there is still a chance the program won’t win.
Knowing the history of that fine organization, knowing the historical figures who have led the fight to improve the lot and image of black people, I’m trusting those members will cast a ballot for Extreme Makeover.
And I trust the leaders of the various local and regional branches will let the Hollywood offices know that they need to be more mindful of the NAACP’s image and the image they want to present to young people when selecting nominees next year.

At this point, when the government of Haiti is estimating 200,000 Haitians lost their lives because of an earthquake Tuesday, Jan. 12, it is getting easier to see several silver linings peeking through the overwhelming sorrow of the event.
I don’t want to diminish the horror or tragedy of that disaster, but just hearing the names of President Bill Clinton and President George W. Bush used in the same sentence for something good actually brought hope to what seems like a hopeless situation.
Their union provides the perfect image of what Americans do best when America is working according to its core beliefs — we forget about our differences long enough to highlight our common grounds and move forward.
President Barack Obama asked the former presidents to head up the private relief efforts for the destitute country. Both presidents agreed. The move is similar to what Bush did when he asked his father, President George H.W. Bush, and Clinton to help out after the Asian tsunami in 2004. That partnership made both presidents look more human.
That could be the case this time around, too. The benefits of goodwill — on the part of leaders both nationally and locally — can have a ripple effect.
Clinton has visited Haiti numerous times because of redevelopment efforts he has spearheaded through his foundation and the Clinton Global Initiative.
In fact, he held a long-scheduled meeting at his Harlem offices on Thursday with dozens of people interested in long-term Haitian development, according to the Washington Post.
Clinton should be able to step in now with a good plan to rebuild Haiti.
That’s good for Haiti. It is also good for Clinton. With the focus on his good works, no journalists are asking Clinton about a remark he hasn’t denied in the newly released book, Game Change.
In an effort to secure the endorsement of the late Sen. Ted Kennedy for Hillary Clinton’s bid for the presidency, Bill Clinton is quoted in the book as saying this about Obama: “A few years ago, this guy would have been getting us coffee.”
Clinton has never publicly admitted saying that nor has he denied it. And now, with the focus on Haiti, he may never have to.
Haiti’s troubles are also good for Bush. After a year of lying low, Bush will be thrust into public view. The disaster will give Bush the opportunity to soften criticism of his leadership abilities, of his knack for ignoring signs of a failing economy and for getting the country stuck in two wars.
It worked for President Jimmy Carter through his involvement with Habitat for Humanity and his international election monitoring.
With Bush’s face attached to something altruistic and non-controversial, I can easily see his negative image receding.
Plus, Haiti’s suffering will give Bush a chance to make up for the mismanagement of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Helping Haiti to arise from this mess like the mythical Phoenix arises from ashes would go a long way toward wiping the negative images of these two men from our minds.
According to a press release, Clinton and Bush will help raise money in the United States to supplement the $100 million in federal aid Obama announced and they plan to keep attention focused on Haiti’s recovery for months and years to come.
“These people, they deserve their chance to build a modern life,” Clinton said. “And I think they can do it.”
Locally, perhaps when the mayoral election rolls around later this year the goodwill of Lexington Mayor Jim Newberry — hesitant though it was — in aiding Haiti will make him look better to some of us, too.
At first, the mayor rejected the FEMA request for Lexington firefighters to be first responders to the relief effort. The team received specialized training to search and rescue from a FEMA-sponsored program. The idea is FEMA trains them and then the city makes them available when disaster strikes.
But Newberry’s reasoning for not sending the nine firefighters to Haiti is that the city would have to pay overtime and times are tough and we can’t afford it. Then — with a little help and encouragement from the firefighters’ union  — the mayor learned FEMA will reimburse the city for the overtime and he agreed to place the team on standby.
By election time his change of heart may help us forget those missteps with the CentrePointe development and the airport investigation.
There’s enough redemption in this to go around. And, if all this happens, then the biggest winners of all will be the Haitian people, who deserve to return better than before.
In a speech he gave in 1959, John F. Kennedy said, “When written in Chinese, the word ‘crisis’ is composed of two characters: one represents danger and the other represents opportunity.”
Some linguists say that translation is a misinterpretation, but in this case, let’s hope Kennedy was right for all concerned.

She’s fairly well known in ­gospel circles in the Bluegrass, but come Monday, Carlie L. Taylor will be heard ­nationally as she performs in Atlanta as the featured soloist at the ­commemoration of the 81st birthday of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
“I didn’t have any ­hesitation,” Taylor said when asked her reaction to the invitation. “I’m nervous, though. I’ve never participated in anything at this level before.”
Taylor, a native of ­Lexington, will stand at the podium in Ebenezer Baptist Church — where King preached from 1960 to 1968 — and deliver her ­rendition of Vanessa Bell ­Armstrong’s Faith that Conquers.

Carlie Taylor

Taylor received the invitation in mid-December from Tony ­Frierson, owner of Frierson ­Media and a transplanted ­Lexingtonian now living in Atlanta.
Frierson has an ongoing relationship with members of the King family, and they have allowed him to select artists for that program, he said. Last year he booked Chizuko Yoshihiro, a classically trained jazz and gospel pianist.
“Carlie Taylor is a phenomen­­al talent and truly blessed,” Frierson said. “I’m excited about bringing her into that event.”
Frierson was talking with his mother about finding a ­performer for Ebenezer service when she suggested Taylor.
“I had heard her a number of times at our church, the House of God,” he said. “Our church has a large amount of very ­talented people. I said, ‘How could I forget about Carlie?’”
Taylor and her husband also will attend the 2010 Salute to Greatness dinner Saturday in downtown Atlanta, where ­Grammy-winning performer and producer Quincy Jones will be honored, Frierson said.
“This is a great ­opportunity for her without a doubt,” ­Frierson said.
Taylor, who is also a minister, was born into a musical ­family and has been singing in the church since she was young. She has performed locally with the group Total Praise.
Some of the lyrics in the song she chose include:
Have the faith
That sees the invisible
Expects the incredible
Receives the impossible
Faith, that can conquer anything
Faith that uproots my problems
Faith, to know God can solve them
Faith, to envision my freedom
I have faith that can ­conquer anything.
“It really sums up ­everything that King stood for,” Taylor said. “He was motivated by things he could see even though it wasn’t manifested. He saw into the future. The song embodies what he stood for.”
Although she’s not ­relishing performing in front of a national audience — the ceremony will be replayed on C-SPAN — she’s not shying from it, either.
The commemorative program starts at 10 a.m. at Ebenezer. Princeton ­University scholar Cornel West will deliver the ­keynote address to an audience sprinkled with dignitaries.
This year marks the 25th federal observance of King’s birthday. The civil rights icon and 1964 Nobel Peace Prize winner is the only black American whose birthday is a national holiday.
That’s pretty heady stuff for a shy woman from ­Lexington, but then, ­sometimes the Lord takes you places where comfort is abandoned.
“I’ve got mixed emotions,” Taylor said. “I’m not one to be up front. I’m extremely shy, but I’ve never let that hinder me. I just go on through the nervousness.”
We shouldn’t forget that King did that, too. He left his comfort zone and performed great work.
I think Taylor will do the same.

I don’t remember how old I was when I won my first writing contest, but I do know it was before I was in fifth grade.
My hometown chapter of the Daughters of the America Revolution awarded me a check for $2 for an ­essay I had written. I was rich.
There were a series of obstacles impeding my becoming a writer, but that recognition encouraged me to forge ahead. It was in a time when writing was appreciated and valued.
What do young writers have nowadays, in the era of text messages and cryptic e-mails, encouraging them to take more time honing a craft that technology seems to be suffocating?
Well, young female writers in grades 9 through 12 have the Young Women Writers Program at the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning.
Entering its eighth year and sponsored by the Kentucky Foundation for Women, the program selects the 15 top applicants who then can explore and improve their writing skills with the hands-on help of adult writers in a variety of genres: cultivating imagery, flash fiction, creative non-fiction, memoir, poetry and young-adult fiction.
Starting Jan. 30, participants will meet on five consecutive Saturdays for four hours, including a catered lunch period. Everything is free.
There was a time when 50 to 70 young women applied, and folks at the center selected the cream of the crop. This year is not one of those times.
Is it because young people prefer the inventive shorthand writing styles used in texting to the longer, more difficult style that is held hostage by stricter rules?
“The English teacher in me is saying yes,” said Bianca Spriggs, a freelance creative-writing instructor at the center who will teach the first four-hour session, on Jan. 30.
“But English is a living language, unlike Latin, and it is meant to change,” Spriggs said, who said she text-messages.
A more probable reason for the small number of applicants, she said, is that the center attracts a high caliber of young women who might have interests in several areas.
“Writing may not be their only love,” Spriggs said. “There is so much for young people to pick from, they may not have time for this commitment. Probably that is more of what is happening.”
Young people today are our next generation of writers, Spriggs said, and they are writing in the language they speak.
Even so, Spriggs said, it is important for young people to know the rules. “Picasso said it is important to know the rules in order to break them,” she said.
Purposely breaking the rules encourages the fluidity of creative writing, she said.
Those who want to apply must submit by Friday a cover sheet, found on the center’s Web site, plus a letter explaining why they want to participate and a creative-writing sample.
“The thing we look at more closely is the cover letter,” said Katherine Greene-Owens, the program coordinator. “We’re looking for students who aren’t doing it because a parent says they must participate. We’re looking for students who are pursuing writing in college, who are interested in journalism or in getting something published.”
Greene-Owens said the program is not looking for polish as much as for potential.
“We’re looking for something that shows a lot of promise,” she said. “If we took that (sample) piece and put it in a workshop with an accomplished writer, where could we take it?”
After participants graduate, they will be asked to read their work during the Downtown Gallery Hop on April 16, and again during the Kentucky Women Writers Conference in September.
For more information or to download the application, go to www.carnegieliteracy.org or call (859) 254-4175.