Tonight's picture was taken in May of 2009. What was being captured here was the tissue paper flowers and vase that Mattie presented to me for Mother's day. The wonderful part about all of this was Mattie made the vase in clinic (using a pottery wheel) and he made the tissue paper flowers with his art therapists. Mattie was very excited to present me with the final product, which was why the staff got my camera and captured this for me. Which I am glad they did!!! The irony is this vase with its flowers remains in my living room even today. The boy is gone, but his gifts and art remain.
Quote of the day: Find something that you are passionate about in making a difference and you’ll find a waiting kinship of people willing to unite for the cause. ~ Wes Adamson
It is now after midnight! During Foundation Walk season, it is safe to say that I put in 15 hour days. That is not an exaggeration. The administrative aspects of the Walk alone are overwhelming, not to mention the actual planning, logistics, communications, and so forth. This morning I decided to migrate away from my computer for a bit and went to zumba class. But I couldn't stay for the whole class. I stayed for half of the class because I had a conference call to join. Typically I wouldn't schedule things concurrently, but this call was with the State of Ohio Department of Health. Peter and I have been invited back to Columbus to present at the Health Department's Forum in June. Each State in our Country has its own State Plan and in this case a comprehensive cancer plan to regulate the treatment and care of cancer. The State of Ohio is opening up its Plan to include psychosocial care language, which is frankly a huge initiative (because I am not sure any other State has such language!) and we are honored to be given a voice at their forum. Apparently they feel that our voice and our vision will help to kick off their meeting given what the Foundation has been able to achieve. I know what the Foundation does is special because I live it each day, but to hear it from someone else, in another STATE, I have to pause and take notice.
A lot is on my plate right now, and we also received an email about potentially writing a book chapter for another book! Needless to say, I did not open that email yet today. I will save that for tomorrow. But I know this is a legitimate request because it is from a psychiatrist who is part of psychosocial standards team! So I view these as all positive steps for Mattie Miracle, which is why I keep pulling the 15 hour days to raise the money necessary to be able to accomplish the things that we do!
No comments:
Post a Comment