Episode 22: Delia McLinden
New York. April 1996. Rent opened on Broadway at the Nederlander Theater. The rock opera details a year in the life of a group of friends living on the Lower East Side of Manhattan known as Alphabet City. Though ravaged by drug addiction, HIV/AIDS and fraught romantic entanglements the friends embrace La Vie Boheme.
Teenage fans slept in front of the Nederlander Theater for tickets. The breakout song Seasons of Love was so popular that Stevie Wonder recorded it with the cast. Tony Awards and the Pulitzer followed. Adding to the myth of the moment was the death of the show’s creator Johnathan Larson only three months before its Broadway debut. Beneath all the complexities and hype surrounding this hit show was the simple question the show asked – how do you measure your life? The answer? Measure the minutes in your life by how much love you can give.
Delia McLinden and her family own Farmhouse Fresh, one of the most successful product brands in the global spa industry. Built into the mission of the company is their living, breathing passion for farm animal rescue. When a client buys a product, Farmhouse Fresh allocates funds to rescue abused or neglected farm animals. The animals are sheltered at the company’s headquarters in Frisco, TX where scents of raw hay and shea butter intertwine. In addition to her work as an executive at the company, in 2019 Delia started her own 501c3 called Archangel Animal Network which transports dogs from shelters in the South and relocates them to families in Northern cities eager to adopt them and save the animals from being euthanized. More than 2,000 dogs’ lives have been spared and countless human lives enriched.
Delia reminds us that the work of the angels doesn’t always show up with fanfare and reviews in the New York Times. Miracles happen when we measure our lives by how much we use the hours and minutes that we have on the planet for good. When we view something or someone that is perceived as disposable as valuable. When we give voice to the plight of the voiceless.
