Grand Junction Fund Raiser, Real Notes

 

The Grand Junction Fund Raiser topped $6K in funds raised. While I have
several blogs to write on the event, I find myself with several (three)
e-mails asking questions that lead me to believe many people do not
understand what drives me or why I do what I do. I hope this short blog
will kind of give you all an idea of why and who.



I have never ever sat on the sidelines; I am not one to point and say
that was not done correctly. I understand better than a lot the
pressures and risks of putting on public events. I understand when I see
an event what it took, what it felt like, and what went on to make it
happen. I am more the type to stand up and say this is how I think it
will work! And if it does not, well I am also willing to take the blame
for the failure. Lucky for me it worked out as a positive thesis on the
Junction event! Because the failure side, while teaching you more
valuable lessons, tends to suck a lot and then you take a lot of crap
from the lookie loos! Looky Loo is defined as the person who never does
it, never takes on the risk (to scary) but sure seems to think they have
all the answers on how you should do it.



This led me to the first phase of the Junction Fund Raiser: The who is
doing it phase, which led me to be the Chef for dessert at Florian's
last year in August. Florian gave freely of his analysis and methods, he
showed me all the ways he obtained donations, how to get the wines on
board. How the money works and how to work the event so it made money.



Next I observed that Florian had a partner in this event that was quite
capable and really the logistics behind the event. Sarah McGregor is
more than a sommelier, she is an excellent detail oriented logistics
machine! So I invited her and her spouse to come to Grand Junction for
our Seven Courses and Smooth Jazz winemakers dinner in September. My
interest here was did she think we had a good enough system to put one
of these events on and pull it off successfully. Since she blessed the
event for everything but one stemware change, I figured we could move
forward!



Then I had to answer a few more questions: Could we do this well enough
to brand it a Chef2Chef.net event along with our own name? Could I
convince Zane that we could pull this off in style and not hurt the
company name? Could I get the Chefs I wanted to attend to spend the
money and come help? Could I arrange enough of a good time for the Chefs
so they might want to attend in the future? I received my answers slowly
through research. And everything kept coming up positive.



Then the last question, did I want to put myself through the stress of
putting one of these together? Did I want to risk the dear online
friendships I have on Chef2chef.net with a fund raiser? While it may
seem like there is no risk, there is great risk with failure as failure
demands blame and blame usually comes with an ostracized individual! So
how confident was I that it could be pulled off? I wrestled with this
question a lot in my head, for the answer I will leave you with a quote
I found decades ago as a young man entering the Marine Corps. It was
Teddy Roosevelt who said it in 1910 in France, and it rings true for me
in everything I like to try. It is the reason I stand up even in
failures and take a freaking bow! Because I know those booing are the Cold
and Timid Souls spoken about by President Roosevelt in the last lines of
this quote and I take pity on them!



"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the
strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better.
The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face
is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs
and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without
error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great
devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best,
knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the
worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his
place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither
victory nor defeat."



Now I know Junction goes in the books as a success, but I thought you
all might want to know a little more about the whacky brain I have and
how it thinks. If you read the above quote and say to yourself "yea that
is RIGHT" we will get along. If you find it uninspiring, we can drink
together fine, but as the saying goes if I have to explain you will
never understand!



The adrenalin has drained, the deed is completed, time to plan next year
and write the blogs about this years event!



I truly thank each and everyone that came to do a course, help prep,
help put it together, those who helped anyway they could from everywhere
in this wide world, it is truly inspiring to work and associate with
people who are willing to get marred in the arena of life and not just
sit on the sidelines!



Lean into the job, we have a lot of work to do to pass the $100K offered
by that rich cooking club!



Bring you more on the fund raiser as I digest it and spit it out. The
good and the bad.



'til we speak again

Chef Bob Ballantyne

The Cowboy and The Rose Catering

Grand Junction, Colorado