On Saturday mornings, my childhood home smelled like fried dough and sounded like big band jazz.
My dad loosely supervised five kids making donuts while his real focus was on pointing out the brilliance of his favorite musicians. We bounced to rhythms and riffs while shaping sticky dough and shaking our piping hot creations in powdered sugar. I fondly remember school field trips to the Cincinnati Art Museum and Music Hall for the CSO’s Young People’s Concerts. One special Christmas, I even watched my best friend dance with the Cincinnati Ballet in “The Nutcracker.”
Years later, my mother orchestrated similar trips for her grandchildren. She brought them to Madcap Puppets and The Children’s Theatre, occasionally allowing her adult children to tag along to relive the wonder we experienced as kids. I want the next generation of kids to have the same opportunity to fall in love with our region’s arts and culture. That’s why I joined the Visionaries by naming the ArtsWave Endowment as a beneficiary of my IRA. It’s a tax-smart way to ensure my support continues long after I’m gone.
The Visionaries who founded ArtsWave in 1927 gave our region a cultural foundation that has sustained the arts for nearly 100 years. I’m grateful to be able to pay it forward for the next generation of sugar-loving munchkins.