President Kayla Mudge started the meeting by commemorating that today was National Navajo Code Talkers Day. The Navajo language was used by the US Marines during World War II. August 14th was initiated to honor the code talkers in 1944.
Attending via Zoom were Jeanie Morgan, Bob Jensen, Machel Considine. The Pledge of Allegiance was led by Jack Rosenberg, and the Invocation was led by Dick Myren.
Next on the agenda was the introduction of guests. Polly Cady introduced Raychelle Wilson from Benedictine University. This is Raychelle’s second lunch meeting with Mesa West Rotary, and she is considering joining our club. Ray Smith introduced Geoff White, a club member who can rarely attend and is a former club President of Mesa Baseline.
Chuck Flint did the raffle. The small pot was $45, and the large pot was $1,505 with the deck down to only 15 cards. Ray Smith drew the winning ticket, which belonged to Deb Koeneman. Deb drew the Ace of Clubs, winning the large pot!
Kayla made several announcements of upcoming events
- 8/18 (Monday)-Service project at Feed My Starving Children from 4:45 to 6:15 pm
- 8/21-club meeting will include a celebration of life of Polo Santiago
- Mentors are needed for Rotary Builds Bridges/McKinney Vento
- 9/15-Service project with City of Mesa for Love Your City event.
- 9/20-Mesa West Experience and Chili
Following announcements, Jay Paulus filled in for Andy to collect Happy Bucks:
- John Pennypacker happily encouraged people to participate in the Feed My Starving Children service event
- Dick Myren was happy to give his donation for himself and Rod Daniels, and was happy to announce that his 7th great grandchild has arrived
- Harry Grossman was happy to have recovered from his cold, though was bummed that he missed the senior citizen discount day at Safeway
- Mike Lutcher was happy to be at lunch today and was happy that, although his cancer has recurred, his medical team at Mayo Clinic is wonderful
- Deb Koeneman was happy to have had a wonderful week with her son and daughter-in-law
- Colleen Coons was happy to have volunteer mentors for the Rotary Builds Bridges program and was happy to thank Geoff White for suggesting his dad, Danny White, as the keynote speaker at the District Conference
- Raychelle Wilson was happy that the Benedictine University food pantry and their Rotaract club are up and running for the school year
- Dennis Rogers, a visiting Rotarian from Tempe South was happy to have lunch with Rotary friends
- Polly was happy to announce that August is Membership Month
- Allan Cady was happy that Dick Myren was at lunch today
- Ed Koeneman was happy that the first Westwood Interact Club meeting of the year was well attended and asked for donations of old t-shirts for dog toys
- Jay contributed to request volunteers for the film festival and to announce that he still had some free tickets to the event
- Warren Williamson was happy to have visited with family and was happy to be here today to tell his customary joke!
- Kayla was happy regarding RLI and the donations for the Rotary Builds Bridges students; she is also happy for the upcoming club events
Following the Happy Bucks, today’s speaker, Donna Vessey (the Gala Guru) gave her presentation. The theme was that artistic expression is a way to build positive mental health.
Donna talked about many types of creativity in our everyday lives and discussed the multiple benefits of creativity. Research shows that children who are creative become better problem solvers. Research has also found that creative arts can help distract from pain and anxiety. Donna had the club do an exercise where we each fantasized about what we would do with a $1000.
At the end of the meeting, John Pennypacker retired Don LaBarge’s District Governor Banner and presented it to Don as a gift.