I love October for many reasons, as I have previously stated. It is a month jam-packed with many of the things I adore about this world, but one in particular has snuck up on me through the years. The overarching event that has taken over not only my life, but my entire family's, is that the 10th month of each year marks Breast Cancer Awareness month.
And trust me, if you belong to my family, you better be prepared to own a lot of pink.
It started off innocently enough. A bracelet worn until it faded white, a magnetic ribbon appeared on the side of the car, stolen and replaced too many times. But as the years progressed, the involvement grew much like the disease we fought to end. Agreeing to join a Relay for Life team, and later signing up for Susan G Komen Race for the Cure. Going to a camp each summer; taking an appointment on a board for your hometown cancer fundraiser. The involvement crept up on us; it seeped into our lives and took over. As bad as that sounds, I think I can speak for my entire family when I say that we wouldn't want it any other way.
Someone asked my mom recently if she ever thought she would own so much pink. Her answer? Of course not. I think the real question is, "Did we ever expect to own so many cancer related things in our lifetime?" Again, the answer is no. "Fight Cancer" memorabilia haunts each room in our house, the clothes in our closets, and the thoughts in our head each night before we go to sleep. I am forever marked with ink for my dedication to these causes, as are other members of my family. Most families go on vacations for fun, nope, not my family. We sign up for cancer fundraisers. But again, it is what we do, and we love every minute of it.
Lately, I've been thinking about why we are so involved with cancer awareness. Sure, my entire family has been plagued by cancer, breast cancer specifically. But honestly, sometimes it feels like we are throwing ourselves into battle for a war that we will not win. Cancer has been around for a very long time, and it will continue on long after we are gone. So why keep trying?
The answer is simple: we do it because of hope. We all know someone who has been afflicted with cancer, and we keep fighting for them because if we don't, that means we have given up on the hope that this horrible disease can be beat. No, cancer may never be gone, but it can be beat. But what I realized most of all through this musing is that we continue to fight these battles for the future of the most important people in our lives.
We fight for our children.
I will never know my maternal grandmother. I will never see her face in person; I'll never be able to hug her. I will never hear her laugh at a joke while she cooks a family dinner. I won't ever know what it is like to have a grandmother because breast cancer took that away from me. I realize that although I will never know her, she has impacted my life more than she probably ever thought she would. I may never have children, but if I do, I'll be damned if they miss out on a chance to know their grandmother because she wasn't aware. Sure, we all know who my mother is and the chance of her not being "cancer aware" is very slim, but this is more than that.
Other members of my family have been afflicted with cancer, and they have all beat it because they were determined to find it early. They believed in early detection, and that is the key. My family wears pink (and other cancer related colors), because it raises awareness. Call us crazy, but if our obsession with pink grabs the attention of one person, that is all that matters. We continue to saddle up and ride into battle not for fame and glory; we do it because we see a future while others dwell elsewhere in time. My family and I have hopes and dreams for this world that we may never see, but we will also never give up trying.
We imagine life without cancer.
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Sunday, October 16, 2011
Brothers
I love my brother. Yeah, yeah, everyone admits that they love their siblings at some point in their life. But really, he is one of my best friends, and I couldn't have asked for a better person to be forced to live with all these years. Sure, he irritates me some of the time, and at other times I wonder if he even claims me as his only sibling. Nevertheless, he is my brother and there really is nothing I can do about that. Colten and I have always had a great relationship compared to other siblings, and I still get the, "Wait, you never fight?" question to this day. No, we don't fight. (This really is true).
One thing that probably keeps us from fighting is the fact that despite our ability to get along so well, our lives have been basically polar opposite from one another. He is 6'4'', and I like to say I am 5'5''. He never cared about grades; I would've cried at anything less than an A-. He liked to go out and have fun in high school while I was at home reading Harry Potter. My brother stayed in Coldwater, and I left to prove myself. I left to discover what I was supposed to be in this world, but it took me six years to realize my brother became the very same thing I had spent so long training to do.
He became a teacher. No, not a school teacher. My brother became a teacher of what takes to be a decent human being.
Colten hasn't always been the charismatic guy that everyone knows and loves. I can remember growing up, his peers would make fun of him for his size. I was just young enough that I knew what was going on, but I didn't know how to deal with it. To this day, I still feel a horrible weight on my chest when I see a child that is bigger than the rest of his or her peers, and I know it is because I love my brother so much and I hated to see him go through that. But, despite all of this, my brother never seemed to let it get him down. He takes ridicule like nobody I've ever seen and it just rolls right off of him. He shows me every day what it takes to stand up to the bullies of this world and just let it go. Some people just aren't worth the fight.
Perhaps the greatest lesson he ever taught me was one I learned just recently. My brother coaches the middle school football team alongside his very good friend from high school, and their team won the league title last Thursday night. As I stood watching the game, I couldn't help but think about my time watching my brother and peers play football on that very field. When the game ended, I watched as my brother and his friend were soaked with Gatorade, and realization hit me like a ton of bricks.
My brother shouldn't be friends with his fellow coach. There really is no rhyme or reason for it, but a moment later I knew. They are friends because my brother did something that most people will never do in their lifetime: he forgave that man. He forgave him for everything that happened in the past, and they are living proof that we do have the ability to let things go. This is something we are taught from a very young age, but as you grow older, you find it harder and harder to accept. But right there in front of me, two people I've known my entire life showed me that it was possible.
Those two men taught a crowd of people a valuable lesson that night, even if neither party realized it. They showed us that humanity's simplest virtues are still out there, we just have to be willing to fight for them. Both men presented a scenario that we have all experienced with peers or siblings, and they showed us how you can overcome differences.
They showed us how to be brothers.
One thing that probably keeps us from fighting is the fact that despite our ability to get along so well, our lives have been basically polar opposite from one another. He is 6'4'', and I like to say I am 5'5''. He never cared about grades; I would've cried at anything less than an A-. He liked to go out and have fun in high school while I was at home reading Harry Potter. My brother stayed in Coldwater, and I left to prove myself. I left to discover what I was supposed to be in this world, but it took me six years to realize my brother became the very same thing I had spent so long training to do.
He became a teacher. No, not a school teacher. My brother became a teacher of what takes to be a decent human being.
Colten hasn't always been the charismatic guy that everyone knows and loves. I can remember growing up, his peers would make fun of him for his size. I was just young enough that I knew what was going on, but I didn't know how to deal with it. To this day, I still feel a horrible weight on my chest when I see a child that is bigger than the rest of his or her peers, and I know it is because I love my brother so much and I hated to see him go through that. But, despite all of this, my brother never seemed to let it get him down. He takes ridicule like nobody I've ever seen and it just rolls right off of him. He shows me every day what it takes to stand up to the bullies of this world and just let it go. Some people just aren't worth the fight.
Perhaps the greatest lesson he ever taught me was one I learned just recently. My brother coaches the middle school football team alongside his very good friend from high school, and their team won the league title last Thursday night. As I stood watching the game, I couldn't help but think about my time watching my brother and peers play football on that very field. When the game ended, I watched as my brother and his friend were soaked with Gatorade, and realization hit me like a ton of bricks.
My brother shouldn't be friends with his fellow coach. There really is no rhyme or reason for it, but a moment later I knew. They are friends because my brother did something that most people will never do in their lifetime: he forgave that man. He forgave him for everything that happened in the past, and they are living proof that we do have the ability to let things go. This is something we are taught from a very young age, but as you grow older, you find it harder and harder to accept. But right there in front of me, two people I've known my entire life showed me that it was possible.
Those two men taught a crowd of people a valuable lesson that night, even if neither party realized it. They showed us that humanity's simplest virtues are still out there, we just have to be willing to fight for them. Both men presented a scenario that we have all experienced with peers or siblings, and they showed us how you can overcome differences.
They showed us how to be brothers.
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Embrace the Weird
October is the best month of the entire year. Yeah, I am saying that October is better than March (my birth month), December, and July combined, and we all know how much I love those other months. But, if you know me at all, you might be conscious of the small fact that I am a bit strange. I'll be the first to admit it, I have a fascination with things that most consider ridiculous and even slightly unorthodox.
I love ghost stories, and I proudly admit that. I don't just mean I love to hear them and enjoy the feeling of being scared; I adore stories, TV shows, and movies about ghosts. Ghost stories enchant me. I can watch those ghost hunting shows for hours without ever growing bored; I watch the same haunted history shows over and over again. My family thinks that I am crazy, and quite often when I am home I get the, "Oh, you're watching that ghost crap again?" I don't even care that it is probably the dumbest thing in the world to believe. Sure, I think the shows are hilarious at times. I squint at the TV for signs of a ghost and yell that I can't hear the "disembodied voices" they claim to capture with their fancy technology. But, I still find myself browsing the channels for anything that hints at a good ghost hunt.
Everyone likes a good story, and I think this is why I am fascinated by ghost stories. The stories that send chills down your spin and keep you up at night hoping you don't hear anything unexplainable in your bedroom. But when you really break it down, a ghost story is just an image of humanity's past. There is always a basis of truth in ghost stories, whether it is the location or the people involved in the story. For some reason, I have always loved history, and I think it is important that we hear these stories and remember them because some day there will be stories about us. The added bonus of a ghost story is the mystery of it all. The main fear that human beings face around the world is that we are afraid of the unknown.
Ghosts entrance us because we don't know if they are real or not. You can sit there and say, "I don't believe in ghosts," but really, how do you know? The answer is that we can't know if they exist or not, and that is the beauty of it all. I want to believe in ghosts, but I do not want to have an experience that makes me believe in ghosts. Because it is that slight edge of mystery that keeps us going and wanting more, and I don't want to lose that.
So why do I love October? Isn't it obvious? Halloween, of course. Halloween is the one time of year when people let go of their skepticism and believe in the unknown. They relish in the fear and embrace the ridiculousness that follows ghost stories. I love every minute of it, and I find myself giddy at the beginning of the month and so sad when it is over. Lucky for me, the shows are played throughout the year, so I don't miss it long. But, in October, there is a literal smorgasbord of ghostly encounters. Everyone falls victim to the allure that Halloween creates, and I can't help but fall into that category more as each year passes.
I know it is weird, but I also don't really care. I can think of several other things that are weirder than believing in ghosts. I have accepted this, and I am not ashamed to admit it at all. I turn on every light when I am walking around my house alone, I won't look out the window in the middle of the night, and I still find myself pulling the covers over my head before I go to sleep. Because even though I know my house isn't haunted...
I'm not taking any chances.
I love ghost stories, and I proudly admit that. I don't just mean I love to hear them and enjoy the feeling of being scared; I adore stories, TV shows, and movies about ghosts. Ghost stories enchant me. I can watch those ghost hunting shows for hours without ever growing bored; I watch the same haunted history shows over and over again. My family thinks that I am crazy, and quite often when I am home I get the, "Oh, you're watching that ghost crap again?" I don't even care that it is probably the dumbest thing in the world to believe. Sure, I think the shows are hilarious at times. I squint at the TV for signs of a ghost and yell that I can't hear the "disembodied voices" they claim to capture with their fancy technology. But, I still find myself browsing the channels for anything that hints at a good ghost hunt.
Everyone likes a good story, and I think this is why I am fascinated by ghost stories. The stories that send chills down your spin and keep you up at night hoping you don't hear anything unexplainable in your bedroom. But when you really break it down, a ghost story is just an image of humanity's past. There is always a basis of truth in ghost stories, whether it is the location or the people involved in the story. For some reason, I have always loved history, and I think it is important that we hear these stories and remember them because some day there will be stories about us. The added bonus of a ghost story is the mystery of it all. The main fear that human beings face around the world is that we are afraid of the unknown.
Ghosts entrance us because we don't know if they are real or not. You can sit there and say, "I don't believe in ghosts," but really, how do you know? The answer is that we can't know if they exist or not, and that is the beauty of it all. I want to believe in ghosts, but I do not want to have an experience that makes me believe in ghosts. Because it is that slight edge of mystery that keeps us going and wanting more, and I don't want to lose that.
So why do I love October? Isn't it obvious? Halloween, of course. Halloween is the one time of year when people let go of their skepticism and believe in the unknown. They relish in the fear and embrace the ridiculousness that follows ghost stories. I love every minute of it, and I find myself giddy at the beginning of the month and so sad when it is over. Lucky for me, the shows are played throughout the year, so I don't miss it long. But, in October, there is a literal smorgasbord of ghostly encounters. Everyone falls victim to the allure that Halloween creates, and I can't help but fall into that category more as each year passes.
I know it is weird, but I also don't really care. I can think of several other things that are weirder than believing in ghosts. I have accepted this, and I am not ashamed to admit it at all. I turn on every light when I am walking around my house alone, I won't look out the window in the middle of the night, and I still find myself pulling the covers over my head before I go to sleep. Because even though I know my house isn't haunted...
I'm not taking any chances.
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