An up-mountain battle. An up a steep, ice covered mountain battle. I don’t want to oversell it too much, but it is so hard!
I hemmed and hawed a bit before writing these posts. I don’t want to paint myself as some super victim. But I struggled a lot. And I feel like sharing some of that struggle with you.
I haven’t done a big fundraising project in a long time. When I was younger (elementary school young), I did those walk-a-thons… Basically you just sent out letters to your family, pediatrician, and parents’ co-workers; then you called it a day.
I have a pretty freakishly huge extended family. So, if everybody gave $20 – bam, I was a millionaire. (That may be an exaggeration.)
But I haven’t done any fundraising projects in the recent past (other than this one), and I certainly haven’t done any for such a hot button issue.
Intellectually, I knew it was a hot button issue. But I didn’t realize how hot button, until I started running for it!
I don’t want to compare equality to other causes, and pretend like I’m judge and jury of what’s worthy of support. But I will share a little story from the year.
I really wanted to run Rock ‘n’ Roll USA (D.C.). When I went to sign up, the bibs were sold out! But, you could still get in if you ran with a charity.
I picked the one with the lowest minimum. I flat out paid for the bib, and was done. I wanted all big public asks to go toward my Broadway Impact page. I didn’t mention this other charity on social media or to my friends.
I wrote literally one sad, little barely-ask email to my dad, explaining “Hey, this charity sold me a bib for a race I really wanted to do. I’m all paid up, so I’m not obligated to raise anything else. But since they did me a solid, it might be nice if I could get them a little extra money. If you happen to know anybody who’d like to contribute, here’s the link.”
He forwarded that email to a few friends (without making the wording of that ask any better), and pew, pew, pew (pitched laser-gun sounds); I had money.
That charity’s mission is to help older abandoned kids get a permanent home. Older kids are often ignored. It’s good that someone’s looking out for them. I’m not saying the charity doesn’t deserve money.
But the difference between the windfall of easy money for a kids charity, and the dollops of money that came in one drop at a time for equality, was astonishing to me.
I saw other people’s fundraising totals skyrocket – and skyrocket fast.
I don’t know how to emphasize this enough – I don’t wish a poor performance on anyone’s fundraising page. I don’t think I’m more special than everybody else. I think there are plenty of great causes.
It was just painful to see everyone else succeeding as I failed. And it was even more excruciating to hear I did everything “right.”
I asked for advice from big fundraisers, and I took all that advice. I made videos. I got someone with a huge twitter following to tweet out my cause. And on and on and on. Granted, I was new to this. Not everything was perfect.
But I felt like I was often banging my head against a wall. That was hard. Really, really hard. I’ll totally admit that I crawled into the fetal position and cried about this on more than a few nights in December. (And other months. Let’s get real.)
I really appreciate everyone who gave. I also appreciate everyone who was a cheerleader, even if they couldn’t give monetarily.
Please, don’t think I’m ungrateful. But this struggle was just… I dunno. Ugh.
I guess I just wanted to share that I thought choosing this issue would make fundraising slightly harder. But I was so wrong. There was no “slightly” about it.
I suppose I’m happy I did it. I think I maybe sort of helped Broadway Impact get its name out there. But, boy was it hard. And I’m sure I’ll be fundraising for them again before you know it. I just don’t feel like I did enough…
If it’s any consolation, it’s INCREDIBLY hard to fundraise, period. Our most recent fundraiser was about a year ago, for (now Senator) Elizabeth Warren, very early in her Senate campaign. we fed people vegan cupcakes, and had live music–costing us over $500 to put the party on. And we raised just over $300. (which we promised to match dolar for dollar so technically we spent $800 to raise $300)
I was fine wih that, as the purpose was not the pile of cash (Hell, we gave her the legal maximum of ten grand, and were very aware that our party wouldn’t raise more than a small fraction of that.) The real benefit of the fundraiser wasn’t the dollars. Rather it was that after the party there were around 15 people who now could tell their friends that they had donated to the cause! People who have put their money where their mouth is make for more confident, energetic advocates.
There is a parallel with your experience. Be damn PROUD that there are now at least a dozen people, probably more, who have anted up for marriage equality for the first time thanks to you. That’s a dozen people who may have conversations in which they let this fact be known others who are not yet on board.
Ultimately, the fight for equality is going to be won one person and one advocate at a time. Dollars themselves have sharply diminishing returns, as we say in economics. (In this way political-related causes are very different from, say, treating kids with cancer, where the number of kids treated is a pure function of how much money was raised.)
So good job! Keep on keeping on.
P.S. And for what it’s worth, you managed to raise about twice as much in a bit over a year than I have in multiple fundraisers over the course of the last decade. And you got me to give more than twice as much as I ever gave to the cause of equality. So even on that angle, fuck it, you were successful.
Thank you so much for this note!
I hear what you’re saying. And intellectually, I’m definitely trying to process it, and be okay with it all. Even the people at the charity said it’s not about the money so much as it is the awareness/excitement/etc.
And now I feel kind of bad, ’cause I’m letting my disappointment in myself shine through on my blog, even though I did have a desire to keep up the excitement… but it’s just hard. And I thought it was probably best to share some my emotional bleghs (to keep the blog real and truthful) (though possibly I shared a little too much – especially considering there’s another post tonight along these same lines).
The fundraising just drove me nuts. I’m too competitive. And I knew this would happen if I fundraised, but I did it anyway.
I have learned some things. And I’ll try to keep getting better if I fundraise in the future (which I almost certainly will, because I feel like I need a chance to be better).
I cannot thank you enough for your generosity. Seriously. So unbelievably grateful for everything you’ve done (and this note). You are a shining example of the kind of person we all should hope to be more like – someone taking many actionable steps for the causes he believes in, spreading the word to others so they can do the same, and staying positive and hopeful throughout it all.