When: We meet Friday mornings from 7:00 AM to 8:00 AM.
Where: We meet at the Mequon Public Market, 6300 W Mequon Rd, Mequon, WI 53092.
Program: This week's program will feature our own Matt Wolf. The topic of Matt's presentation is Empathetic Elephants.
The greeter will provide either the thought, a Rotary minute, share a family moment or a cultural tradition ... anything they would like to start off the day positive.
Upcoming "It's your Rotary moment" assignees:
Bruce Carter (12/9)
Seth Duhnke (12/16)
Bobby Fisher (12/23)
Lucia Francis (12/30)
Note: If you are unable to act as "It's your Rotary moment" assignee when scheduled please arrange for your replacement.
Club Assemblies have been scheduled for the following date(s): 12/16, 1/20, 2/17, 3/17, 4/21, 5/19
Photo caption: John, Julie and Sara at Plaza Mayor, Madrid, Spain
Having retired, employment is in the rearview mirror. As Sachel Paige said, “Don’t look back. Something might be gaining on you!” Heeding Sachel’s advice, I am running down the highway of life at full speed. For myself I bicycle about 100 miles a week. This summer I completed the 235 mile ride across Wisconsin in 3 days. When not biking, I am on a golf course learning life’s most important lesson, humility.
At home my wife Julie and I are busy supporting our 16 year old daughter Sara’s activities. As a family we travel as often as possible. This past year included trips to Spain, Florida, Virginia, Colorado and Michigan. Our service is principally through the League of Women Voters, our church and Rotary. We have enjoyed hosting our club’s exchange student, Otso Miettinen.
If you are interested in joining your fellow Rotarians and their family members at The Rep's Christmas Carol, our club will serve as volunteer ushers on Thursday, December 15th.
Details to follow, but please let me know (email: rblazich@gmail.com) if you are available on the evening of the 15th and interested in ushering.
The host city of the 2023 Rotary International Convention is multiple cities rolled into one
By Meagen Martin Photography by Rhys Martin
The vibrant and stately city of Melbourne is an Australian capital city in every sense of the word. Now, I understand that Canberra is Australia’s federal political capital and Sydney its financial center. But if you dig into Melbourne’s rich history and look closely at its many tourist attractions, you will discover that the home of the 2023 Rotary International Convention might easily claim the crown as Australia’s culinary, cultural, sports, and shopping capital, in addition to being the capital of the state of Victoria.
In the leadup to the 2023 convention, we asked two Australians — Rotary Down Under magazine Editor Meagan Martin and her husband, creative director Rhys Martin — to test those claims. They got a friendly assist from several local Rotary members, who provided insider intel on their much-loved city on Australia’s southeast coast. If their generosity is any indication, Melbourne may very well deserve another accolade: the capital of hospitality. Join us in Melbourne 27-31 May 2023 and find out for yourself. — WEN HUANG
Like other places in the Dominican Republic, Los Cocos de Jacagua faces shortages of suitable housing and sanitation infrastructure. For 15 years, the Rotary Club of Santiago Monumental has addressed community needs there in tandem with a Rotary Community Corps, creating a library, a community center, playgrounds, and a financial cooperative.
They installed hundreds of latrines and provided medical care, among other contributions, many accomplished with the help of international partners in District 7710 (North Carolina). The Santiago Monumental club has begun building homes for families, completing nine as of February at a cost of about $10,000 each, says club member David Crow. “Our international partners spend a week at a time with us, providing labor for the construction effort,” Crow says. “This alliance is a powerful way to promote peace and offer Rotarians the opportunity to live and work together with local Rotarians and the communities served.”
After oxygen, silicon is the most prevalent naturally occurring substance in the Earth's crust. Add two parts of oxygen to one part silicon (a process that happens naturally there), and you get silicon dioxide, a core component of most rocks and sand. Heat up that sand to about 3,090 degrees, and it becomes a liquid, hardening into glass when it cools.
Though glass is derived from a naturally occurring material, once that substance is transformed into bottles, it is hardly a boon to the environment. Each year in the U.S., people throw away some 8 million tons of glass, a bulky part of landfills that can last ages. The Environmental Protection Agency reports that only about a third of glass that Americans buy gets recycled.
The Rotary Club of Chelan, Washington, found an opportunity to mine some of that glass out of the waste stream. Its 911 Glass Rescue project turns used bottles and broken glass back into sand that can be used in gardening, landscaping, playgrounds, and biological water filter projects. The club partnered with local agencies and businesses to buy a glass pulverizing machine from Andela Products. Company President and CEO Cynthia Andela is not just a glass industry expert; she also happens to be a member of the Rotary Club of Richfield Springs, New York. "I've been a Rotarian for years, and I've been selling these machines for years," says Andela. "But this Chelan club project, which unites both worlds, made me realize just how much Rotary can do."
Club members told us the story of how they make sand from unwanted glass.
Matt Wolf is the Academic & Career Planning Coordinator for MTSD.
It's entitled Empathetic Elephants. The presentation will deal with experiences I have had related to being empathetic. In particular, I will cover how empathy plays an important role in challenging conversations about Equity and how White Males, in particular can struggle with elements of the discussion.
