Yep... That's Wayne Elsey

Ok.... so I'm finally getting a few minutes to update and post some of what's been happening. F I N A L L Y.... I'm TAKING the time because it's important to me.

Wayne is the Founder and CEO of Soles4Souls and I had the great opportunity to meet with him briefly on his way home recently from a speaking engagement.

At first I was a little floored that someone who had a vision for others to not be shoeless wanted to meet me. Then I realized I'm just like him. We want to see things happen and see people get off of the couch and do something. Not just talk about it. It takes courage, faith and willingness to take a risk and do something that hasn't been done before. Those are the traits that I see in both of us. Being willing to take a chance and if it fails well then at least we tried. If it succeeds than what a wonderful thing to make the lives of others better.

At his suggestion I called Mrs. Busch, Wayne's 10th grade english teacher who he writes about in his book, Almost Isn't Good Enough. It had been raining non-stop for days. Streets were flooding out right and left, schools were having a hard time starting due to electrical outages and well I think I was just feeling a little down so I decided to give her a call. What a great woman. So full of energy and spunk. I loved having the conversation with her and hope to go meet her one day soon.

This is me and Sean Lewis. Sean is the Faith Engagement Manager at the Soles4Souls Headquarter office in Tennessee. In other words, he works with a lot of churches and religious organizations that want to get involved with Soles4Souls.

Which brings me to another important topic. One of the questions I continually get asked in doing my shoe drive is "what church or religious organization are you with?". Soles4Souls has NO religious affiliation which is one of the reasons why I like them. I'm not against religion I simply try to keep things simple. Being shoeless doesn't care about your color, race, religion or beliefs. It's a lot like hunger, aids and cancer. When you don't have shoes on your feet, you don't have shoes on your feet. The other thing that comes to mind is that out of the group that went to Africa, we were all people that wanted to do something for the good of all people. Imagine me with 20 other people and not really knowing anyone else. After our first 12.5hr flight and definately by the end of the trip it was sad to say goodbye to some of the great people I got to spend 10 days with.

On that note, I'm going to go collect some more filled boxes and take them to the warehouse.

Have a great weekend everyone.

Hugs

Rachel