Peace and pb&js
By Courtney Lea Lupe
For the past few years I have done a ton of soul searching and even more self deprecating. This has left me feeling more lost and exhausted than ever. It has finally come to a head and I am at a point where I am ready to face my deep fears surrounding both failure and success.
My internal struggle professionally has been between following my passion for design and following what I believe to be my calling; helping others. This struggle, combined with a shit ton of self doubt, has paralyzed me— causing me to do neither. I can now accept that although I know I have a natural talent for design, I am happiest when I am helping others so I have decided to follow my heart. I am excited to announce that starting this fall, at the ripe age of 42, I will head back to school to begin studying for my Masters degree in counseling with an emphasis on addiction counseling at DU. With two years sober and my newfound self-awareness I think it will be a good fit. Plus, I hear they have a pretty good hockey team.
For the past few months I have been assembling sack lunches and delivering them to the homeless population in Denver through the services of Bus Stop Ministries. When they started they would just take food to bus stops; kinda cool. They are a Christian-based organization, but definitely more spiritual than religious. Thanks to so many beautiful women in my life, we have handed out countless peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and we’ve already raised enough money to buy 36 bus passes for the homeless population to use! (To put this in perspective, this is more passes than were donated in the entire year of 2016 and we did it in just three days.)
My sister-in-law died a homeless alcoholic and I cannot tell you how much I hope there was someone there who showed her, for even one second, that she was loved and cared about. It’s more than a bus ride or a sack lunch, for me it’s a way of saying, “you haven’t been forgotten.”
To everyone in my life who has given me a hand, I cannot thank you all enough for your support and generosity. Peace and pb&js to all.
