Pink Is Everywhere

A couple weeks ago was the annual Breast Cancer Awareness Run, bringing joggers and walkers from the Bay Area to downtown St. Pete. Tuesdays and Thursdays are garbage pick-up days and if you are in the right spot in town you can see pink garbage trucks cruising the streets. Watch NFL games last month and you'll see the players sporting pink towels, pink shoes and/or cleats, wrist bands and helmets ribbon decals.

If you go to the Breast Cancer Awareness website you can peruse 11 pages of pink stuff to buy and browse the Smith and Wesson website and you can buy a 9mm handgun with a pink pistol grip claiming that a "Portion of the Proceeds Will Be Donated to a Breast Cancer Awareness Charity." It's everywhere. You can't, if you have the gift of site, avoid the pink ribbon crusades to bring awareness to breast cancer and research. And while I may be a bit appalled by the pervasiveness of the campaign and the exploitativeness of the marketing, there is no doubting that pink is here to stay.

I have known several women who have had breast cancer, some with radical mastectomy's and, thankfully, still with us. But I was thinking, what are the rates of survival amongst the major cancers. Your contributions to fund ongoing work to eliminate this scourge seems to be making headway. Recent studies conclude that breast cancer has an 86% success rate for the first 5 years.

Here are some other figures and rates*:

Breast cancer is 86%
Prostate 99%
Thyroid 96%
Testicular 95%
Melanoma 89%
Colon 85%

Stomach 24%
Lung 15%
Esophagus 14%
Liver 8%
Pancreas 5%

* Based on five years

I knew of a fellow who put up a good fight against Pancreatic Cancer, Lanny Rosenthal, who worked for the Chicago offices of Blick Art materials. Sadly, Lanny lost his fight and Blick carried on in his honor to form an annual day of charity giving at Blick. I think they had their 4th annual day last summer and it continues to be a thoughtful and worthwhile idea.

In this season of sharing, please continue to give to the charities of your choice.

Comments

Flashback Friday

Class, Or Lack Thereof The Dwight Vice gravestone in Oquawka, Illinois. I bring this old chestnut out every so often just to remind me that class is classless. Dwight Vice was killed in his home near Oquawka in 2001. It was one of those things that can generate crime: two guys thought Dwight had a lot of money stashed at home because of his pot-selling sideline to supplement his fishing job. Not really one of those big drug deals gone-bad things. Marijuana was, according to the trial, about the only stuff Dwight sold. But these two guys barge into the house and killed Dwight and attempted to kill his 11 year old kid, Darryl, before they took off with what money they could find. His son, now 23, was stabbed in the back and left for dead. He survived and is wheelchair bound and has undergone several surgeries to repair his wounds. He will be paralyzed for life. None of this is pleasant. Reading the f...

Philippe Park and The Tocobaga Indian Mound

About ten miles or so north of Bedlam is a place called Safety Harbor. Its the place that has the 300-500 year old oak that the city tried to kill I featured a couple weeks ago on BFE . They have a pretty nice park that has some interesting history, too. Count Philippe landed here and introduced the pineapple and cigar making to the Tampa Bay area. Today, however, I want to mention something else about this area, besides the really nice scenery. Phillipe Park was also the home of the Tocobaga Indians. The Tocobaga occupied the Tampa Bay area from around 600 A.D. to the 1600's. This is a fairly common view of old stately moss-laden oaks down here. This shot was taken atop the only Tocobaga Indian mound in the area. This exact spot is home not only to the Tocobaga until they died out, but then to Count Phillipi who settled the area after the Tocobaga died out. The place is full of oak and ...

The Mary Davis Home - Part 2

None of these pictures were taken by me, they came right from the MDH website. I am posting these so that friends who have never seen inside where I worked can gain access. After 27 years I have many stories, tales and acquaintances. But, I wouldn't know how to express them appropriately in a few paragraphs. I enjoyed 98% of my stay there and hope I made a difference in the lives of a fraction of the kids who entered. The original MDH at this site was just the front part. The large red-roofed area in back was added on in the 90's. This is the Jerry Carlton library. It was unofficially named after one of the counselors who truly loved the place. He passed away around 2002, I think. Mr. Farber looks like he is explaining a few things to a client. The classroom. Activity area with the gym behind the windows. Another shot of the classroom. It was a little different area to teach since we had 2 classes and 2 teachers i...

Existing In BFE

Search This Blog