Day 2: The Young and the Ruthless

I got an envelope in the mail yesterday with the print on the front claiming that there was a special gift tucked away inside for me. I opened the letter from St. Jude Children's Research Hospital to find a picture of a cancer fighting 2 year old little girl looking back at me. The gift was my yearly holiday themed address labels for me to use on my Christmas cards (and I do!). Guess my second day of service was literally staring me in the face. I've logged on this morning to www.stjude.org and browsed the site. To be honest, I usually just mail in a check whenever they send me a letter. It never occurred to me - until today - that I could save the paper and just donate online... wake up call. Serving sick children and Mother Earth both at the same time.

I didn't always support St. Jude monetarily. I didn't always know that there were so many children struggling to fight illnesses that my experiences taught me only "elderly" people got. Once while gathering with friends at Chili's, the waitress brought around a stack of 6x6ish inch papers with chili peppers printed on them, and a couple of crayons. She instructed that if we would like to donate $1 to St. Jude's and color a chili however we chose, that they would hang it up in their restaurant. I did so, and thought more about how creative I could be with the crayons and piece of paper than how my single donated dollar was going to help St. Jude's fund research to help kids not much younger than me live a little longer. A short while after the Chili's evening, I caught a tv special on an early Saturday or Sunday morning with Alec Baldwin narrating stories about 3 different children that had gone to St. Jude's in order to treat their Leukemia and brain tumors. Two of the children did not live through their treatments, but the other got to go home to the arms of her very happy and loving family. I sat and bawled, I could not turn the channel.

To quote the website about the history of St. Jude's:

"When late entertainer Danny Thomas opened the doors to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in 1962, he was not just changing the lives of those children who would walk through its doors. He was changing lives across the world."

Yes, my life was changed that morning. I knew I wanted to be a Mother to my own children someday; what if my children ever had to visit St. Jude's? When I donated, I knew then that I had supported them, if they should ever have to support us through a very trying time; but that wasn't my only reason for giving. Cancer had taken the lives of my grandmother and grandfather just a few years before. Cancer is everywhere. It touches families: babies, toddlers, kids, teens, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles, cousins.... friends. If my single dollar went towards givng a Mother an extra day to spend with her daughter or son, then it was money well spent.

But I'm not just writing about St. Jude's to get you to open your pocket book. I'm asking more that you open your heart. I'm asking that you be grateful for every healthy child in your life. I'm asking that you not take your own health for granted, or even that of your siblings, parents, grandparents or neighbors. Some children are born into this world and only live a short while. Some parents will visit headstones this Christmas, while you are sitting warm in your living room, holding your loved ones close.

So lets give thanks for a place like St. Jude's for all they're doing for the young people in this world. They are the ones, after all, that will take our places when we've gone. Help me share the story of these deserving kiddos that are *ruthlessly* fighting cancer for the right to live their lives every day?

Thank you!