I hate running. I hate it so hard. Knee surgery twice, asthma, and having huge and ridiculous boobies just adds up to wicked pain and general disgruntlement. Plus it's boring as hell if you have to do it inside. At least on an elliptical you can watch Netflix.
So anyway, so I'm walking. I'm walking 39 miles in Boston to raise money for breast cancer. And I am hell-bent on making it happen, the right way. The marathon is called the Avon 39, and it's a full weekend, May 16 and 17. It sounds hardcore, and maybe it is. My first thought, though, was "Yo I can totally do this, like right now, it will be super easy." (And then I was like, ...wait a minute.) This is the link to my page. You can use it to sign up and join my team (Team Winnie) or to donate or whatever you want.
On March 11, I found out that a client of mine—after whipping Hodgkin's butt (HARD, too), being diagnosed with breast cancer, having a double mastectomy, and, when I met her, had so many tumors in her gut that she looked 7 months pregnant, and yet still had the grace and style to be decked out in silk leopard-print pajamas and get her eyelash weave taken care of—after ALL this, she'd passed away. I was helping her write a book on her journey and on cancer. She wanted to leave that legacy behind. She never got to finish it, which breaks my heart.
The next day, I just happened to see this walk on Facebook. March 12 was the 6-month anniversary of losing my uncle Barry to lung cancer that had just spread everywhere. At the end I wasn't even sure what cancer was where and even, really, what kind of cancer he had, and I don't want to know. All I know is that on September 11, after I'd spent a week trying to play nurse (I was sorely unprepared for THAT mess) and hearing him moan in pain and cry out for his wife and tell us how he just couldn't fully wake up and not being able to do anything for him except stroke his head and coerce him into taking more morphine, I left to go home, get more underwear, and sleep on an actual bed for a night instead of on the couch that my aunt hates getting hair grease on. And on September 12, my mother called me and told me he was gone.
I can name everyone I still thankfully have with me. I can recount the stories of every single person I've lost to some form of cancer. But, to be frank, fuck this. I'm done. No more. This ends, and it's going to end with me having had my hand in it.
Please, please help me. My journey—39 miles, which is a hell of a lot smaller than the journey of these people in their fight against these diseases—starts on May 15. My goal is to raise $2000. Sign up to walk with me, donate just $1, even just pass this along to your friends. Let's get the word out that we can make some kind of difference, no matter how small, and let's do it not just to beat breast cancer, but for every cancer out there. A victory for breast cancer is a victory for each variety of cancer.
In Memoriam:
Barry Coleman
Stacy Tomlinson-Gibson
Paul Hamel
Avi Concool
Genny Lescroart
Kim Bedesem
Marla Kurtz
In honor of:
James Boatwright
Lee Ludwig Meyers
William Clyde
Barbara King
Andrew Coles
Betsy Welsh
Who do you know who's battled cancer? Tell me, and I'll include their names on the list on my webpage. This is for all of them.
Again, the link to my page is right here. Help me make it happen.
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