I had several thoughts as I walked around the neighborhood taking pictures:
1) Did we win an award? If so, I should write an article about it for the Lawrenceville Patch.
2) Is this in honor of Autism Awareness Week?
3) Does someone just like blue ribbons?
The answer was 2 -- as it was April 2nd, it was in honor of Autism Awareness.
Then I began to wonder, how does something like this raise awareness? As I walked around the neighborhood taking pictures I asked random strangers about the ribbons. Not one of them (okay, it was a quiet afternoon and I only saw 3 strangers) knew why the ribbons were on the trees.
My next step was to email the editor of the Lawrenceville Patch (Lawrenceville.Patch.com). He forwarded me a link to a Patch article about the town being decorated for Autism Awareness (I suppose I should read more of the Patch than just my articles).
Mystery solved -- at least for my neighborhood.
However this reminded me of the time I was in college (late 1980s) and word got around that if we wore blue jeans on Friday it would show we were in support of gay and lesbian people. Really? Blue jeans on a college campus in the late 1980s (height of the fear of AIDS) would really show that? Try something that stands out like wearing lime green (school colors were blue and gold).
The blue ribbons were a nice touch, but I still don't think they raised awareness. Only those who knew what they meant got the message. Perhaps a sign with the blue ribbons would have helped.
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