Indigo Life

There was a time in my life that I need a place to stay. I needed a roof over my head and a bed to lay my head. A friend put me in touch with Andrew and Lauren who shared with me their spare bedroom. I barely knew them and they welcomed me like I was family.

That is just how they are. They love with open arms. The Dayton music video was a gift to the city, Nucleus, co-created with other community driven entrepreneurs, was a gift to the city. Lauren leads UpDayton. Andrew leads workshops and hosts events.

With Indigo Life Media, the video marketing agency they created and run, Andrew and Lauren are transforming the way we consume content and interact with our community. They empower you to build virtual relationships that enhance offline experiences through our expertise in video production and strategic content creation.

With Indigo Life Network, they craft and curate original shows streamed online to build a community that embraces a lifestyle rooted in self-expression, consciousness, and social responsibility.

Personally and professionally, Andrew and Lauren White of Indigo Life Media care. They live authentically and powerfully. They are in action in the community.

And when I asked them to sponsor the LORE Mainstage event they saw the synergy.

Thank you, Indigo Life Media for supporting me, personally and professionally.

Andrew and Lauren White

Hungry Poetry

Anastasia Nagle

As soon as she speaks, I am mesmerized by her accent, this daughter of the Ukraine whose has adopted Dayton as her home and is raising her family in this city that has welcomed us both. I have reached out to her to ask if she will share her story of hunger on the stage because I know that she has known childhood dinners where her family had nothing but onions to eat. But this bright-eyed, smiling women, sitting at this coffee shop with me, tells me that she has no story. She was never hungry. And so I ask her again, reminding her that I know about the onions, and she counters with a story about her grandmother who lived through Stalin starving her country. Her grandmother knew hunger, nearly starving to death when the Russian dictatorship raped her people of their resources and intentionally starved the entire country. Her grandmother’s story sounds surreal and otherworldly and I can see how her childhood stomach grumbling would pale in comparison.

Hunger means something very different to Anastasia than anything I can fathom. She will not allow her onion story to sit next to her grandmother’s experience living through the Holodomor, a genocide that killed millions in her grandmother’s generation. As she describes her grandmother’s fear next to the love and appreciation of this matriarch who is so much a part of who Anastasia is today, I know that this story is one that must be shared. The poetry of her words lures us in and then she reveals a stark reality of her ancestry. History, memory, love, life and beauty play out in her story.

Reliving these stories isn’t easy and Anastasia asks for time to decide whether or not she is ready.

When she calls me back to agree, I sit in the gravity of the decision. Gratitude captures me. Anastasia will be on stage at the LORE Mainstage Hunger event. She will be there to honor her grandmother, her history, her ancestry and her legacy.

Her story will shock you. It is powerful and beautiful and haunting and true.

So buy a ticket. Sponsor the event. Be there.

CareSource

“This event would not be possible without our sponsors.”

I have heard these words at least a couple hundred times in my lifetime. They are at the end of events and radio shows and podcast and websites. And now I personally understand just how absolutely real these words are.

When I received the email from CareSource that they were going to sponsor the LORE Mainstage event, I literally cried. It was like a huge stress had been lifted. With that one email, this event became positive. We were no longer in the red.

CareSource is big player in the Dayton area. I can say with pretty good confidence that if you live in the Miami Valley you life has been somehow touched by the CareSource family. I personally have held CareSource health insurance. As a small business owner, options are often limited and CareSource has options on the marketplace for small business owners. (https://www.caresource.com/oh/plans/)

CareSource is investing in Downtown Dayton: The new CareSource Office Tower, on the 100 block of First Street, employs 800 employees. (http://www.downtowndayton.org/new-caresource-office-tower-construction/)

CareSource donates to our region: Since its launch in 2006, the CareSource Foundation has provided over 1,300 Ohio nonprofit organizations nearly $17 million to strengthen and support community initiatives. (https://www.caresource.com/about-us/news-media/news/ohio-nonprofits-end-2018-with-a-gift-from-the-caresource-foundation/)

CareSource employs over 4,000 people in the Miami Valley.

CareSource provides money and resources to fight hunger in the community because they understand the relationship between food and health. (https://daretocare.org/grant/)

And CareSource is sponsoring the Lore Mainstage: Hunger event.

This event would not be possible without our sponsors. So, check out what CareSource is up to and see how you can support our supporters.

CareSource