How quickly it is forgotten that Midas’s gift was a curse, not a blessing.
THE LOOKING GLASS
AFEW DAYSLATER KERI and I sat in our white minivan in the parking lot outside a financial consultant’s office. The meeting we had just endured was not what we had expected. We had talked for nearly two hours about trust funds and portfolios, the problems of wealth and how to shield our children from the money should they become drug addicts and alcoholics. The well-meaning advisers, in an effort to help us protect our funds, shared story after story of families broken by wealth. My mother was always worried about the effect of money on her children. It was a trait I would likewise carry. In an interview with the New York Times, my agent said, “I’ve never seen anyone so nervous about money as Rick.”
Now Keri was worried as well.
“Not exactly what I expected,” I said.
Keri looked at me seriously. “Maybe we should just give the money back.”
This led to a lively discussion. By the time we left the parking lot we had come to the conclusion that our windfall was not inherently good or bad. What mattered was how we chose to use it. We decided that we would not rush out and buy new cars and toys. We would move gradually. And we would teach our children how to use money by helping others. We decided to start a foundation.
I had one other desire. My father was in his sixties and was still doing heavy construction work without any retirement put aside. On several occasions my brothers and I had discussed what we could do to help. I went to my father. “Dad, you can retire now.”
His reaction rolled me. “I don’t need your money,” he said tersely.
In trying to help, I had offended him. Having money was more difficult than I imagined.
A few days later it occurred to me that my father’s business experience and master’s in social work qualified him to run our foundation. I asked him to come help us spend our money helping children. My father was more than happy to dust off his M.S.W., and to everyone’s benefit, he accepted the job.
Every child is worthy of love.
THE LETTER
Once my father was settled in his new position, we sat down to discuss the direction our new foundation would take.
“Keri and I want to help abused children,” I said, “but we’re not sure how. I think if you look around, the cause might find us.”
My father went up to the University of Utah to meet with Dean Kay Dea of the Graduate School of Social Work. “If anyone knows what Utah’s children need,” my father said, “it’s him.”
At the dean’s suggestion we sponsored a children’s advocacy conference, inviting child advocates from around Utah. We asked them directly: What is the single most important thing we could do to help our abused and neglected children?
We learned three things from our conference: First, that for the most part these advocates did not communicate with one another. Second, that there are fierce turf wars in the field of child advocacy and these groups did not especially like one another; in fact, we had to seat some of them at different tables. Third, we learned that nearly everyone in attendance was in agreement about what needed to be done to help children.
It was determined that we desperately needed a building, a shelter where a child could be taken twenty-four hours a day, rather than just being thrust into the first home available whether it was an appropriate environment or not.
But more than just a shelter, this facility should be a one-stop mall of children’s services, bringing these services to the child in a comfortable setting and encouraging dialogue between different child advocacy groups by putting them under the same roof.
In addition it would become a community resource center, strengthening families and children and drawing support from the community it served through donations and volunteerism.
To maintain the integrity of the foundation that would operate the facility, I committed to pay for all foundation administrative overhead costs from the sales of my books, so all other donations went directly to help the children.
The concept of the Christmas Box House was born.
