NONPROFIT
A MILLION SPARKS OF
Joy
BY JULIE NELSON CONTRIBUTED PHOTOS
Rotary Lights shine on in 2020!
Rotary Lights, one tradition that can't be broken by Covid-19, will shine on in 2020. Photos by Cassie Clark.
C
anceled events and festivals have you feeling blue? Cheer up: soon a million sparks of joy will be lighting up the night and putting a twinkle in your eye. If ever there was a festival meant for a pandemic, it’s the one where people either stay in their cars or walk around outside with their hands and faces covered. Rotary Lights, you can’t come soon enough!
Volunteer Sue Crothers helps keep Rotary Lights running behind the scenes.
MOSTLY THE SAME Of course, even this outdoor festival will have to make accommodations for the current pandemic. Don’t expect Santa to be inviting hundreds of children to sit on his lap, for example, and do expect the igloo and warming house for the ice rink to be handled differently as well. As for the kickoff parade and the crowd-
38 OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2020 www.crwmagazine.com
drawing lighting ceremony ... maybe just wait for next year on those. But the most important aspects of Rotary Lights will remain the same. Starting the evening of the Friday after Thanksgiving, Riverside Park will light up with more than a million bulbs of different colors, illuminating everything from fire-breathing dragons to skaters on ice. Visitors will be able to walk or drive through the park, and trucks and volunteers will collect those all-important donations of food and cash. BEHIND THE SCENES Other components remaining the same are ones the public doesn’t often see, like the work done by all the volunteers and the food that keeps those volunteers happy and warm. Sue Crothers is the driving force behind the cookies, sloppy joes, pizzas and gallons of hot chocolate that add to the camaraderie. Over the course of 43 days, Crothers coordinates nearly 1,500 meals donated by restaurants, churches and private individuals. And the best part, she says, is that she doesn’t even have to ask—restaurants call her asking to be included in the supply of food donors. “You know you have a special place in people’s hearts and minds when you have this type of support,” she says.
