March 27.
Tell Me…What Are you Waiting For…Turn This Thing Around – Van Halen, ‘92
As I’m typing this entry, I am also texting with my buddy Brad. He’s a bit down after his most recent appointment. The waiting is not easy. It’s slow going and frustrating for him right now as his counts have not yet returned to normal. He’s a runner and runners have goals. Runners have plans. Runners have numbers to crunch.
Speaking of, did you know that there are more than 232,000 people in the U.S. living with leukemia? That’s as many people as there are in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Almost as many as the 255,824 people living here in Fort Wayne. That’s how many people have leukemia right now. And this year? Another 44,000 cases – 3.3 times more people than are at the Kid Rock concert right now at the Coliseum.
If you think about it, each of us only has a “right now,” right now. Our time on this earth is very short. Yet we are all here for a very specific reason. I was yipping the other day about how I think I was born in the wrong century – that I’d have been better off in the days of the Pony Express instead of all this technology. But then I realized each of us is placed within this beautifully intertwined story of life at exactly the right time. That, and I would not have rocked a bonnet well and corsets were for suckers.
The people we have, had, or will have in our lives are in them for a reason. Sometimes we know and recognize it, sometimes not. But eventually we will all look back and ask questions such as did I try my best? Did I use what I was given? Did I love well? Did I make a difference in the life of another?
For our sake, I not only hope we can answer yes, but I hope we can mean it. Because there are at least 255,824 + 44,000 people right now counting on it.
30 Days to go.
