Dear friends
I am really not sure I can express eloquently enough how much your presence at Schanks meant to all of us on Saturday night. I knew there were going to be a lot of people there but was bowled away when I actually saw everyone gathered into one area at Schanks. Many people purchased their tickets at the door so there were many wonderful surprise attendees!
The support you have all given, unconditionally, over the past many months has been a source of strength for both myself and my family! As I looked around the room on Saturday night it struck me that this was probably the first time ever that we had a gathering of every sub group of friends we have. One tends to associate with one group at a time but Saturday night was a totally different experience! Attending, were friends from my work including teachers, support staff, parents and students, friends from Bill's work, childhood friends, badminton friends and Winter Club friends, neighbours, friends of both of my kids, family members, my friend Rhonda from the Terry Fox Foundation and of course friends and family of other team members! It was my goal to try to hug and talk to every single person who was there to support me! To be honest....it was the most overwhelming but gratifying evenings of my life! My eyes are welling up as I write this! My only regret was that I couldn't spend more time talking to each of you and if I missed anyone please forgive me! I tried really hard to connect with each of you but there were so many people there!
Not only did you come, you shopped! The fundraiser raised a grand total of $16,200! With this money our Honey Badgers are sitting in fifth place overall behind big name teams like Enbridge with a total of $97,000. I think we may just make our $100,000 goal! My hat goes off to my son Geoff and his wife Lindsey who really were the driving force behind this event! They have a fabulous group of friends and family who helped and many of you just offered up donations without us even asking for them.
Now all we need to do is focus on getting ready for the big ride! Bill and I arrived in Vancouver today. It is raining here...(Bill is sure that is all it ever does in Vancouver) but hopefully over the next month we will get some of those beautiful days Vancouver is famous for. We are staying by the Capillano Bridge and there is a great path network around here where we can walk Boomer and ride our bikes.
Tomorrow I have a full day at the hospital, an endoscope, bloodwork and a meeting with the doctor before starting treatment on Wednesday. Am I scared? You bet I am! Am I hopeful? Most certainly!
Am I grateful? More than I can say! Am I ready? As ready as I can be! I don't know if this is going to work but I'm sure going to give it a try! We arrived today with our bikes, our golf clubs and two bags of dorritos, all the things necesary for a holiday! We are going to do our best to make the next month seem like a vacation assuming I tolerate the treatment well!
So thank you all! Keep those emails coming! I am going to really miss all of you back home!
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