Happy Halloween
Last night Jill and I couldn't resist looking at photos of them as children in their Halloween costumes. There they were lined up at the back door franticly waiting to leave. Pictures, I always needed pictures. Bill's mom worked tirelessly on their costumes year after year. Every year they had a new one. They were clowns, bunnies, leopards, and even a chocolate chip cookie. Jackie thought that one up on her own and grandma put together a brilliant costume for her.
I remember many a Halloween with them. Bill stayed home and handed out candy. The three of us joined our neighbour and freind, Shirley, and their kids to canvass the neighborhood. Like their costumes the weather was never the same from year to year. I recall more bone chilling, cold and snowy nights than I did warm autumn ones in Regina. The most memorable one was when we had an arctic front fall down and leave snow up to my thigh on the streets. There was never any question in the children's mind that we were going out. We managed to do a half dozen neighbourhood houses and the kids wanted to quit. The kids gave it their best try, but winter won that one.
I recall the Halloween that both the girls broke out in Chicken pox a few hours before we were to go out. That was a very sad Halloween for the girls. As their freinds came to trick or treat, they could only watch. So many tears. However as word got out to family and freinds that they weren't able to go out, they were given candies from everywhere. They did better that year than they did on any other Halloween.
When I was young, I really “hated” Halloween. I know that I must have been the only kid in the sixties that did not want to go out and begged mom not to go out. There are so many reasons for that. The biggest one was that I was very shy and it took a real act of faith to go to a strangers door and ask for candy. Mom and dad sent my younger sister and I with our older brother who couldn't wait to ditch us down the street. It didn't help that we never had costumes. We went as cowgirls or as “Indians”. Mom cut a hole in a “gunny sack” and there I was in this shapless itchy brown bag. What is a gunny sack anyway? I remember every year I wished for one of those Halloween masks to wear. That was at least cool and I could hide my face. One year I did get my wish. To my dismay it was hot. It was impossible to see out to see where you were going. And the smell. To this day, I can still smell the mask.
The final reason for not liking the Halloween thing was that the candies were less than remarkable. More than half the candy was the hard toffee candy kisses. I disliked them. In my day, the candies were that, suckers, bubble gum, and other unwrapped terrible tasting candies. Rockets were my favorite. If word got out that someone was giving away apples, we would run to that location. Chocolate bars were unheard of, well at least in my neighbourhood. When we got home there would be the inevitable looking through our booty and the always fight inducing trading issues with my brothers and sister.
I was so happy when I was finally old enough to stay home.
A few years back my granddaughter was out on her first Halloween night in their new neighborhood. She was definitely pre-school age. It was a stormy and extremely cold wintry night. Bill and I had gone over to be there during this exciting time. Alanna and Chris were back in less than an hour. They were absolutely frozen. I asked Alanna all about her experience. She plunked herself down on the step of the stairs. She was still in her unicorn costume and plainly said to us; “it's just not worth it.”
That is my granddaughter!
WKH
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Saturday, October 13, 2007
WRITING IN THE WORKING WORLD
“Beware the barrenous of a busy life.”
by Socrates
My writing callus on my finger has softened, my journal pages are fewer and the days between the blogs are many more. I miss my journalling.
I forgot how much working full time takes out of a life. It is not just the 8 hours at work, but it is also the half hour commute on either side. It is the getting dressed up and made up in something other than jeans and a t-shirt. It is arriving 10 to 15 minutes early and leaving a few minutes late. It is doing all the necessary living things in the precious few evening hours after work. It is re prioritizing life to fit in the most important tasks before bedtime rolls around and that hour seems to sneak up on me all too easily.
Reading and writing have taken the brunt of my new priorities. However for almost three years I have been writing about my world. I have learned to look at the ordinary and see extraordinary things in them. My work world has given me so many new observations to a life I have not participated in for a time. The stories are roaming restlessly inside of me. I try to give them form and yet somehow the day passes without a word written. Silently I file them away until the time is right to write.
My words and stories will wait for me. Will You?
WKH
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Labour Day Classic Stew
Get out the cold f/x. The cold virus has been unleashed.
Over the years working in the doctor's office and the medi clinic before that, I noticed a trend emerge every fall. As precise as a German train schedule the parents called into the office for an appointment for their school age son or daughter because of their cold symptoms. It was always the third week of September.
The children went back to school usually after the Labour Day weekend. They gathered together after a two month long break away from each other. Rested, relaxed and in relative good health they filed into their new classrooms for their new year. They mingled and giggled and shared and hugged. All the while they were brewing up the newest batch of cold virus in the best petri dish ever known to exist, their classrooms.
One by one the children succumbed to their virus stew and ended up sick with a cold. Children don't usually like to share unless it is unwittingly. It was not long before their parents (and grandparents) became the recipients of their newest petri dish virus stew. In the clinics we began to see the parents around the Thanksgiving long weekend. The parents were not as resilient as their children. They were however dedicated to their work at the office. Nothing as simple as a cold would keep them home.
Off to work they went sneezing and coughing their germs around the office and laying down their germs on every thing they touched. The office petri dish brewed and bubbled until the parent's coworkers without children came down with the cold. We saw these patients in early November. Appropriately this would be the time the children would be back into the doctor with their third or so cold. As the community became sick, the immune suppressed became sicker. Nurses worked feverishly to combat the flu with the newest batch of the flu shot.
The medical office became hectic with the flu and cold patients. The patients came in sicker. The number of ill patients from all ages and backgrounds became overwhelming. The office cold and flu peaked just before the Christmas holiday. The patients came in looking for what I called “the magic wand” treatment. They wanted the doctor to make them better because it was Christmas. They couldn't possibly be sick because... The excuses ran the gamut. None the less we sent them home to recuperate from their illness with some TLC advise – rest.
Thus the Christmas vacation began. The children and many office workers went home for their two week break. They rested and mostly recuperated from the Labor Day Classic viral stew.
We would see the cycle repeat itself once again in the third week of January. Usually the cold and flu would hang on until the sunny days of spring.
This is not scientific, but it is what I noticed when I worked as a nurse in the office. Thus when I had my granddaughter over for a sleepover this weekend, it was really a ride down memory lane when she arrived with a cold.
It hasn't changed.
WKH
Over the years working in the doctor's office and the medi clinic before that, I noticed a trend emerge every fall. As precise as a German train schedule the parents called into the office for an appointment for their school age son or daughter because of their cold symptoms. It was always the third week of September.
The children went back to school usually after the Labour Day weekend. They gathered together after a two month long break away from each other. Rested, relaxed and in relative good health they filed into their new classrooms for their new year. They mingled and giggled and shared and hugged. All the while they were brewing up the newest batch of cold virus in the best petri dish ever known to exist, their classrooms.
One by one the children succumbed to their virus stew and ended up sick with a cold. Children don't usually like to share unless it is unwittingly. It was not long before their parents (and grandparents) became the recipients of their newest petri dish virus stew. In the clinics we began to see the parents around the Thanksgiving long weekend. The parents were not as resilient as their children. They were however dedicated to their work at the office. Nothing as simple as a cold would keep them home.
Off to work they went sneezing and coughing their germs around the office and laying down their germs on every thing they touched. The office petri dish brewed and bubbled until the parent's coworkers without children came down with the cold. We saw these patients in early November. Appropriately this would be the time the children would be back into the doctor with their third or so cold. As the community became sick, the immune suppressed became sicker. Nurses worked feverishly to combat the flu with the newest batch of the flu shot.
The medical office became hectic with the flu and cold patients. The patients came in sicker. The number of ill patients from all ages and backgrounds became overwhelming. The office cold and flu peaked just before the Christmas holiday. The patients came in looking for what I called “the magic wand” treatment. They wanted the doctor to make them better because it was Christmas. They couldn't possibly be sick because... The excuses ran the gamut. None the less we sent them home to recuperate from their illness with some TLC advise – rest.
Thus the Christmas vacation began. The children and many office workers went home for their two week break. They rested and mostly recuperated from the Labor Day Classic viral stew.
We would see the cycle repeat itself once again in the third week of January. Usually the cold and flu would hang on until the sunny days of spring.
This is not scientific, but it is what I noticed when I worked as a nurse in the office. Thus when I had my granddaughter over for a sleepover this weekend, it was really a ride down memory lane when she arrived with a cold.
It hasn't changed.
WKH
Monday, August 27, 2007
Unretirement
“Find a penny, pick it up.
And all the day, you'll have good luck.”
I was sitting in a room this morning waiting for my job interview to begin when I looked down and saw a shiny new penny lying on the floor at my feet. Immediately this child's ditty ran through my head. Sitting alone, I bent over to pick it up and set it on the coffee table. I thought if I put it in my pocket that bad luck might follow. I knew this was a good omen for me and as it turned out, I was hired on the spot before the interview ended.
For many months I have struggled with my retirement lifestyle. Don't get me wrong, it has been wonderful beyond my wildest dreams. Yet I seem to have great difficulty believing and saying that I am retired. So many questions! How come it has turned out this way for me? Dare I say privileged? Why have I made the decisions that I have? Why have I been unable to call this time I have been unemployed, retirement?
I picked up a book from the New and Noteworthy section of the library called What Color Is Your Parachute For Retirement Now For The Rest Of Your Life, by Richard N. Bolles and John E. Neilson.
In the first few pages of the book I read the following quotation which seemed to put into perspective so many things I have been struggling with.
“So whereas the traditional concept of retirement planning was primarily about money,
more realistic approach now also gives equal weight to health and happiness.” and
“Retirement planning is changing in another way too. Our parents and grandparents were
mostly focused on how to retire 'from something' – their job. For you, though,
retirement planning can focus on retiring TO something – your next stage of life.”
Basically, the book explains the life stages as follows; education as a time of self development and no freedom. Next we enter the life stage of work and productivity and still little freedom. The third stage of life is retirement with it's leisure and freedom. It is a journey towards freedom. Yes, that is it! The book suggests that we want to do more than survive retirement – we want to thrive in our retirement.
Nursing allowed me to gain some insight into these different stages of life. I loved having one on one conversations with my patients. Over time, I noticed a common theme throughout the senior citizens; REGRET. “If I had it to do over...”, “it wasn't suppose to be like this...”, “getting old is not for the faint of heart..”, and “I wish I would have done this ten years ago.”
One particular quiet patient sat on the edge of his bed as I dutifully advised him on healthy living lifestyles. After a moment he asked me if he could give me a piece of advise. Sure, I said, “Simply,don't wait to do those things you want for retirement. Do them now because you never know what retirement has in store for you. My retirement has been a great disappointment with my poor health, an ill wife, and no desire and energy to do those things I always wanted too.”
It was a pivotal moment in my life. My mom and dad both died at a relatively young age, 64 and 66 respectively. His advise rang a warning in me that I had always knew since my parents' early death.
Many new terms are out there for retirement; the new retirement, Re – firement, Re – wirement, rest of life, the second half of life, the third age, and maybe even unretirement. However you choose to label it, it can be a time of great health and happiness as I have found out.
To that end, I decided to work this temporary almost full time job to continue to enjoy those things that I have embraced as my next stage of life. I have not gone back to work as an R.N (much to the puzzlement of Bill and the person who hired me). I seem to have a need to change things up from time to time. I am going to work as a Clerk II in the mass immunization clinics. I will be the front line worker prior to the administration of the flu shot. Since I have been told that a change is a good as a rest, this should fulfill that part. I start next week and it finishes early December. Working three months a year is a dream come true. Yet again I am blessed in ways that I cannot explain.
“If you follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living.”
Joseph Campbell
WKH
And all the day, you'll have good luck.”
I was sitting in a room this morning waiting for my job interview to begin when I looked down and saw a shiny new penny lying on the floor at my feet. Immediately this child's ditty ran through my head. Sitting alone, I bent over to pick it up and set it on the coffee table. I thought if I put it in my pocket that bad luck might follow. I knew this was a good omen for me and as it turned out, I was hired on the spot before the interview ended.
For many months I have struggled with my retirement lifestyle. Don't get me wrong, it has been wonderful beyond my wildest dreams. Yet I seem to have great difficulty believing and saying that I am retired. So many questions! How come it has turned out this way for me? Dare I say privileged? Why have I made the decisions that I have? Why have I been unable to call this time I have been unemployed, retirement?
I picked up a book from the New and Noteworthy section of the library called What Color Is Your Parachute For Retirement Now For The Rest Of Your Life, by Richard N. Bolles and John E. Neilson.
In the first few pages of the book I read the following quotation which seemed to put into perspective so many things I have been struggling with.
“So whereas the traditional concept of retirement planning was primarily about money,
more realistic approach now also gives equal weight to health and happiness.” and
“Retirement planning is changing in another way too. Our parents and grandparents were
mostly focused on how to retire 'from something' – their job. For you, though,
retirement planning can focus on retiring TO something – your next stage of life.”
Basically, the book explains the life stages as follows; education as a time of self development and no freedom. Next we enter the life stage of work and productivity and still little freedom. The third stage of life is retirement with it's leisure and freedom. It is a journey towards freedom. Yes, that is it! The book suggests that we want to do more than survive retirement – we want to thrive in our retirement.
Nursing allowed me to gain some insight into these different stages of life. I loved having one on one conversations with my patients. Over time, I noticed a common theme throughout the senior citizens; REGRET. “If I had it to do over...”, “it wasn't suppose to be like this...”, “getting old is not for the faint of heart..”, and “I wish I would have done this ten years ago.”
One particular quiet patient sat on the edge of his bed as I dutifully advised him on healthy living lifestyles. After a moment he asked me if he could give me a piece of advise. Sure, I said, “Simply,don't wait to do those things you want for retirement. Do them now because you never know what retirement has in store for you. My retirement has been a great disappointment with my poor health, an ill wife, and no desire and energy to do those things I always wanted too.”
It was a pivotal moment in my life. My mom and dad both died at a relatively young age, 64 and 66 respectively. His advise rang a warning in me that I had always knew since my parents' early death.
Many new terms are out there for retirement; the new retirement, Re – firement, Re – wirement, rest of life, the second half of life, the third age, and maybe even unretirement. However you choose to label it, it can be a time of great health and happiness as I have found out.
To that end, I decided to work this temporary almost full time job to continue to enjoy those things that I have embraced as my next stage of life. I have not gone back to work as an R.N (much to the puzzlement of Bill and the person who hired me). I seem to have a need to change things up from time to time. I am going to work as a Clerk II in the mass immunization clinics. I will be the front line worker prior to the administration of the flu shot. Since I have been told that a change is a good as a rest, this should fulfill that part. I start next week and it finishes early December. Working three months a year is a dream come true. Yet again I am blessed in ways that I cannot explain.
“If you follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while, waiting for you, and the life that you ought to be living is the one you are living.”
Joseph Campbell
WKH
Thursday, August 9, 2007
A Letter From Camp.
I found a computer. It is one mile from my campsite. It is free. The walk along the edge of the lake is awesome.
I am having a wonderful time.
I feel grubby.
I have finished one book.
I have done many sudoku and kakuro.
The nights are strikingly black.
The nights are deafeningly quiet.
The sun is hot. The water is warm.
The bears are close but have not entered the campground.
The eating is non stop.
The huckleberries are in season and is excellent on an ice cream sundae.
I could really enjoy this life style.
WKH
I am having a wonderful time.
I feel grubby.
I have finished one book.
I have done many sudoku and kakuro.
The nights are strikingly black.
The nights are deafeningly quiet.
The sun is hot. The water is warm.
The bears are close but have not entered the campground.
The eating is non stop.
The huckleberries are in season and is excellent on an ice cream sundae.
I could really enjoy this life style.
WKH
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
My Embarassing Problem of Vacations
I am once again leaving for a two week vacation.
Goodness this is getting embarrassing. :)
This time I have been invited to go camping with my sister, her husband and various extended family members. I believe there will be more than a dozen of us young and old at any given time. We are going to Priest Lake, Idaho.
They have been going to this lake for 29 years. I have gone once before with Jill and Jackie. That was about 19 years ago. As I remember it was a pretty cool holiday then. The girls got lots of lake swimming and tanning in.
I say camping, but really it is camping in a motorhome. I believe they have stove, fridge, fridge-freezer, microwave, oven, but no dishwasher. Well I guess that is why I am along.
My sister says it is a relaxing time where we will read and sleep on the beach. She says she usually polishes off a half dozen books. I’m all over that.
I will have to leave my laptop at home. I believe there is no wireless hotspot at this little piece of heaven. I have discovered that I am rather attached to my computer. It might even border on addiction. Thus this will be a good little timeout for me. However if I do find a computer at the little corner store, I probably will go on a time or two.
So for now, I will leave it behind and will concentrate on all those big questions without the help of the computer. For example:
Why do you have to wash out the inside of the dishwasher?
Why can you write on a pencil eraser with a pencil?
Why does a soap bar get grubby and dirty?
Why does a person who is retired and thus unemployed, have more holidays than ever before?
I will think of you all while I am on the beach examining the inside of my eyelids.
Don’t worry my sunscreen and bug spray is packed. I will practice safe sun.
WKH
Goodness this is getting embarrassing. :)
This time I have been invited to go camping with my sister, her husband and various extended family members. I believe there will be more than a dozen of us young and old at any given time. We are going to Priest Lake, Idaho.
They have been going to this lake for 29 years. I have gone once before with Jill and Jackie. That was about 19 years ago. As I remember it was a pretty cool holiday then. The girls got lots of lake swimming and tanning in.
I say camping, but really it is camping in a motorhome. I believe they have stove, fridge, fridge-freezer, microwave, oven, but no dishwasher. Well I guess that is why I am along.
My sister says it is a relaxing time where we will read and sleep on the beach. She says she usually polishes off a half dozen books. I’m all over that.
I will have to leave my laptop at home. I believe there is no wireless hotspot at this little piece of heaven. I have discovered that I am rather attached to my computer. It might even border on addiction. Thus this will be a good little timeout for me. However if I do find a computer at the little corner store, I probably will go on a time or two.
So for now, I will leave it behind and will concentrate on all those big questions without the help of the computer. For example:
Why do you have to wash out the inside of the dishwasher?
Why can you write on a pencil eraser with a pencil?
Why does a soap bar get grubby and dirty?
Why does a person who is retired and thus unemployed, have more holidays than ever before?
I will think of you all while I am on the beach examining the inside of my eyelids.
Don’t worry my sunscreen and bug spray is packed. I will practice safe sun.
WKH
Monday, July 30, 2007
The Sun Has Set On Another Weekend To End Breast Cancer
The Sun Has Set On Another Weekend To End Breast Cancer
I am sitting on my deck reflecting on the past 72 hours. The sun is melting into the horizon in beautiful shades of pink and orange. How appropriate it is to watch this beautiful sunset after a very emotional and challenging hot weekend for all the walkers, volunteers and crew who participated in the Calgary Weekend to End Breast Cancer Walk.
The sun has set on another successful walk. The news sound bytes have emphasized that 2036 walkers and an approximate 700 volunteers have raised 5.6 million for the Alberta Breast Cancer cause. And buried deep within these articles around the news making manly pink tutus, the glittering pink costumes, the hot pink bikers and the brilliantly decorated bras is an allusion that these participants may have raised awareness in the community.
This was my third year of participation for this event. On its inaugural event in Calgary in 2005, I blindly signed up to walk the 60 kilometers just for the challenge. I followed a grueling regime of practice walks and amazingly raised more than the two thousand dollars for breast cancer.
I was prepared. Or at least I thought I was! No one prepared me for the emotion that surreptiously ran through the weekend. The survivors’ stories and their spirited participation were inconceivable to me. Throughout the walk, I followed participants who lovingly and with forethought had the pictures of their loved ones pinned to their back. Some were living legacies but most were not. I wanted to know more about these loved ones because up to this point, I had not personally known anyone who was diagnosed with breast cancer. However as a nurse, I knew many patients in the office who courageously fought their cancer battle with hope and optimism.
At those low points along the route where one had to dig deep to put one foot in front of the other, morale appeared from the least likely spots. Neighborhoods along the route bedecked their homes in simple pink ribbon and pink balloons and left their sprinklers on to refresh the walkers. I thanked them for their awareness in our cause. Others made huge signs that they held up for us to read. They read “Walkers Rule” and “You Make a Difference.” They seemed to be aware. The children of the impromptu pink lemonade stands may not have been aware, but I walked that they may never fear the words, Breast Cancer. There were too many signs that wrote their poignant words; “I lost my mom to breast cancer. Thank you.” They were all too aware.
I was being thanked and all I was doing was walking.
The kilometers melted together as I came to a sudden realization that this was bigger than me and my ability to walk 60 kilometers. It was about the toll that breast cancer takes on those diagnosed with it. It was about the loved ones left behind to mourn their loss. It was about those one in nine people yet to be diagnosed by this dreadful disease. It was about the powerful stories yet to be told. I was aware and it humbled me.
I finished the walk and never felt the same after it. The emotional closing brought forth the tears that came not only from knowing that one can achieve goals they set their sights on, but those goals can metamorphize into something bigger if one opens their eyes and hearts..
The past two years, I have worked crew in the medical tent. I can empathize as the walkers hobble up to the medical tent and wait patiently for one of the “Blister Buster Crew” (as we are affectionately known) to come to their aide. I blindly work on their feet as I urge them to tell me their stories. The survivors talk to me about their choices of optimism and hope. The daughters and granddaughters who lost their mothers and grandmothers tell me about their empty lives without them. The husbands shed tears through their stories sharing with me the love they had for their brave wives and their final moments in their battle against breast cancer. I met Chad from Ontario who was participating in his 18th Weekend since its inception in Canada in 2003, because as he tells me “he just wants to make a difference.” I wanted to know why they did this and they told me.
I found it somewhat poetic that as I poked their blisters on the soles of their feet and bandaged them with care and loving attention that it is definitely easier to look after the soles of the feet than their blistered souls that breast cancer has left them with.
The sun’s pink hues have left the sky just as the rich tapestries of the pink participants of the Weekend have gone home to rest. The orange glow remains in the night sky in the dying moments of the sunset. Orange is the color of passion. It is passion that will bring the walkers, crew and volunteers back next summer to do this all over again.
It is a burning passion to defeat breast cancer.
WKH
I am sitting on my deck reflecting on the past 72 hours. The sun is melting into the horizon in beautiful shades of pink and orange. How appropriate it is to watch this beautiful sunset after a very emotional and challenging hot weekend for all the walkers, volunteers and crew who participated in the Calgary Weekend to End Breast Cancer Walk.
The sun has set on another successful walk. The news sound bytes have emphasized that 2036 walkers and an approximate 700 volunteers have raised 5.6 million for the Alberta Breast Cancer cause. And buried deep within these articles around the news making manly pink tutus, the glittering pink costumes, the hot pink bikers and the brilliantly decorated bras is an allusion that these participants may have raised awareness in the community.
This was my third year of participation for this event. On its inaugural event in Calgary in 2005, I blindly signed up to walk the 60 kilometers just for the challenge. I followed a grueling regime of practice walks and amazingly raised more than the two thousand dollars for breast cancer.
I was prepared. Or at least I thought I was! No one prepared me for the emotion that surreptiously ran through the weekend. The survivors’ stories and their spirited participation were inconceivable to me. Throughout the walk, I followed participants who lovingly and with forethought had the pictures of their loved ones pinned to their back. Some were living legacies but most were not. I wanted to know more about these loved ones because up to this point, I had not personally known anyone who was diagnosed with breast cancer. However as a nurse, I knew many patients in the office who courageously fought their cancer battle with hope and optimism.
At those low points along the route where one had to dig deep to put one foot in front of the other, morale appeared from the least likely spots. Neighborhoods along the route bedecked their homes in simple pink ribbon and pink balloons and left their sprinklers on to refresh the walkers. I thanked them for their awareness in our cause. Others made huge signs that they held up for us to read. They read “Walkers Rule” and “You Make a Difference.” They seemed to be aware. The children of the impromptu pink lemonade stands may not have been aware, but I walked that they may never fear the words, Breast Cancer. There were too many signs that wrote their poignant words; “I lost my mom to breast cancer. Thank you.” They were all too aware.
I was being thanked and all I was doing was walking.
The kilometers melted together as I came to a sudden realization that this was bigger than me and my ability to walk 60 kilometers. It was about the toll that breast cancer takes on those diagnosed with it. It was about the loved ones left behind to mourn their loss. It was about those one in nine people yet to be diagnosed by this dreadful disease. It was about the powerful stories yet to be told. I was aware and it humbled me.
I finished the walk and never felt the same after it. The emotional closing brought forth the tears that came not only from knowing that one can achieve goals they set their sights on, but those goals can metamorphize into something bigger if one opens their eyes and hearts..
The past two years, I have worked crew in the medical tent. I can empathize as the walkers hobble up to the medical tent and wait patiently for one of the “Blister Buster Crew” (as we are affectionately known) to come to their aide. I blindly work on their feet as I urge them to tell me their stories. The survivors talk to me about their choices of optimism and hope. The daughters and granddaughters who lost their mothers and grandmothers tell me about their empty lives without them. The husbands shed tears through their stories sharing with me the love they had for their brave wives and their final moments in their battle against breast cancer. I met Chad from Ontario who was participating in his 18th Weekend since its inception in Canada in 2003, because as he tells me “he just wants to make a difference.” I wanted to know why they did this and they told me.
I found it somewhat poetic that as I poked their blisters on the soles of their feet and bandaged them with care and loving attention that it is definitely easier to look after the soles of the feet than their blistered souls that breast cancer has left them with.
The sun’s pink hues have left the sky just as the rich tapestries of the pink participants of the Weekend have gone home to rest. The orange glow remains in the night sky in the dying moments of the sunset. Orange is the color of passion. It is passion that will bring the walkers, crew and volunteers back next summer to do this all over again.
It is a burning passion to defeat breast cancer.
WKH
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