“Blood is life until it is given; then it is love”

TRIBUTE – Jimmy Carter, an American politician and humanitarian, served as the 39th President of the United States from 1977 to 1981. At 99 years of age, he is the oldest living former US president.

Carter served as the 76th Governor of Georgia from 1971 to 1975 and as a Georgia State Senator from 1963 to 1967.

His greatest legacy after leaving the White House was his humanitarian work for others.

After seeing a picture in a magazine of Jimmy and his wife Rosalynn building homes for the homeless with Habitat for Humanity, I was so inspired that I went out the next day to volunteer.

Just one problem: no matter how hard I tried, every nail I hammered in bent instead of going in straight. Not to mention, I banged my fingers several times, so my sore fingers quickly decided that building houses wasn’t my area of ​​expertise and kept looking for ways I could help.

Jimmy and Rosalynn founded the Carter Center, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the lives of people around the world. Carter was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002.

He is the author of thirty books on a wide variety of subjects, including political and personal memoirs, books on aging, family, and religious faith, a novel about the American Revolution, a volume of his own poetry, and a children’s book co-written with his daughter Amy.

Carter has been nominated nine times for the Grammy Awards in the category of Best Spoken Word Album and has won the award three times. With his Grammy win in 2019 at the age of 94, he is the third oldest person to ever win a Grammy.

“Our Values ​​in Danger: America’s Moral Crisis,” a book by Jimmy Carter, was a number one New York Times bestseller and won a Grammy for the spoken version of the book.

Carter received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1999. He put his belief in moving beyond war into action and, after leaving office, traveled to many different countries to pray for peace with world leaders.

Carter opposed racial segregation, supported the growing civil rights movement, and became an activist within the Democratic Party. In 1979, he was awarded the Martin Luther King Jr. Nonviolent Peace Prize.

It wasn’t Jimmy Carter’s long list of well-deserved accolades for his many accomplishments that inspired me to volunteer like he and Rosalynn. It was seeing their love for others put into action.

After I once donated blood at a blood bank, I received a T-shirt with the inscription.

“Blood is life until it is given; then it is love”!

Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter; peacemakers.

(Judy Joy Jones is an author, actress, artist, photographer, poet, and librettist. Her acting credits include appearances on the Discovery Channel and in films and television shows such as Dreaming of the Dead, Dora the Explorer, Trauma, and The Walking Dead. Judy’s next book, When a Saint Calls, Surrender!, promises to be inspirational, as it is about her work with Mother Teresa. This article was published in Street Spirit newspaper. Judy is a regular contributor to CityWatch.)