Saturday, October 16, 2021

Saturday, October 16, 2021

Tonight's picture was taken in October of 2008. Mattie received this incredible gift from Jerry and Nancy, the hospital's music volunteers. Mattie had a special relationship with this duo and because they knew Mattie loved and responded to music, they got him his own keyboard. Mattie loved it throughout his cancer journey. After Mattie died, we donated the keyboard to the hospital for other children to have the same enjoyment as Mattie. Musical distractions were gifts when trapped inside a small hospital room.  

Quote of the day: Today's coronavirus update from Johns Hopkins. 

• Number of people diagnosed with the virus: 44,910,637
• Number of people who died from the virus: 724,127

Two weeks ago I received an email from a woman. She was looking for volunteer opportunities for her niece. It turns out that her niece lost her sister to osteosarcoma three years ago and as a result no longer lives with her parents. Mainly because the death of one of their children caused them to divorce and they are both facing many health issues. Which is why the aunt has stepped in to help raise her niece. An amazing woman. Today I had a zoom call with her niece and had the opportunity to talk to her about Mattie Miracle and how she and her school could potentially get involved in our work. I asked her how to engage and capture the attention of students her age regarding childhood cancer. Her answer was honest and I think quite accurate.... they need to have some sort of personal connection with the disease. She says her friends are aware and interested in supporting the cause because they know what she has faced with her sister. Given all this young person has faced, I was very impressed with her ability to talk about difficult issues and her desire to want to help and make a difference in the lives of other families like her own. 

For the rest of the day, Peter and I painted the garage. This wasn't top on our list, but because of all the electrical panel work that was done, which landed up happening in the garage, we had no other choice but to paint. 

That said, look at the original color of the garage. Trust me the color is hideous. The kind of color that makes you look ill, even in the sunshine. 

Of course if we were outside, Sunny wanted to be with us. Limp and all! 

It's beginning to look cleaner and brighter!

You have to be Houdini to reach the very top of the walls. We have ladders, but they did not help. So I had Peter attach a paint brush to the end of a long stick, and that is how I painted the edge between the wall and ceiling. At first I was going to have our painters tackle the garage, but they were honest with us. They said it was going to be costly and it was only a garage. All true, which is why we are only painting the walls ourselves.