I am posting the following at the request of Jana, a resident of Nashville, TN. Their plight has not received enough coverage in the media, and I believe it is important to help spread the word about what they are going through and how we can help.

I just wanted to send out this plea on behalf of this great city in which I reside. We need your help and support. Nashville, and surrounding areas, are drying out but the water is the least of our concerns now. We have thousands of people without homes, without clothes and without hope. Homes can be replaced and clothes can be washed but hope is harder to come by.

You see, we all watched as America spent hundreds of hours and millions of dollars helping a third would island recover from a devastating earthquake. While necessary and hugely important, many people lamented that our country was more concerned with others than our own. Yet, we here in Nashville watched our rivers rise and our creeks overflow as the national media was focusing their attention elsewhere. We watched homes flood and people die while NBC, CBS, ABC and Fox ignored our increasingly dire situation.

Yes, the oil spill is important. I'm from Pensacola and still have family in Louisiana. Yes, the car bomb in Times Square was important. I have visited that very area and watch the ball drop every New Years. Yes, Arizona is acting foolishly with regards to their stance on immigration. I was born in Mesa and still have relatives there. I get all of those things and they all affect me too. But none of them were urgent. The oil spilled, the bomb was disarmed and the law was passed. Yet Nashville still sat, ignored, forgotten, flooded.

The national news focused on things that didn't happen and ignored the thing that did.

We need your help. If you can't come here to haul trash, or sweep up or hold hands, then donate. Donate money to the Nashville Red Cross or Hands on Nashville. If you can't donate money, donate things. I know we all have extra clothes, shoes, toys, books, toiletries to send. If you don't know where to send them, send them to me. I will take them to the places that need them. If you can't send things, then tell people. Tell your friends, tell your schools, tell your churches or synagogues or community centers. Tell your book club, your tennis club or your car club. Tell your work, your coworkers, your clients, your family. Tell anyone. Tell EVERYONE!

We need you right now. Show us that we aren't alone and that we all learned a lesson from Katrina and what happened in New Orleans. Prove to us that America takes care of it's own. Don't let us down. We can't afford for you to do that.

I give you my permission to publish this on blogs, send it to your friends, send it to your newspapers, send it via carrier pigeon to the farthest reaches of the world. I give my permission for you to help.

Red Cross: www.nashvilleredcross.com

Hands on Nashville: www.hon.org

My address: 784 1st Ave. N., Nashville, TN 37201

My cell: 615.852.5262

With kindest regards and crossed fingers,

Jana Mitchell
Resident of Nashville, TN via FL, GA, AL, MS, AZ, HI, and AK

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