I recently made the commitment to do a 100 mile(century) bike road in Lake Tahoe in June 2010 to raise money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society through Team in Training. The goals is for me to raise $4300 by the middle of May. I made the decision to do it because I had to "larger than life" people in my immediate family fall ill in 2009. I have always participated in sporting events and love to cycle so it seemed a perfect match and a great way for me to give back. For the first time in my 41 years, I could say I was doing something significant and important that would make a difference in a life or death situation. I decided it was time to have a conversation about it with 7 year old stepson and let him in on what I was doing. He listened quietly and asked a couple of questions and then slowly walked into another room. I questioned whether or not I had done the right thing by talking to him about cancer at such a young age. He suddenly appeared from his bedroom with $2.00 in his hand and told me he wanted to give to my fundraiser. I was so touched. In our house, we have a board and he earns $0.25 for each good deed/chore he does. I started thinking about what that meant for him to give me his $2.00. It meant trying new foods he really did not want to try, feeding the dog a couple of times, cleaning his room and making an "A" on a weekly spelling test. He had worked hard to earn that $2.00 and had been saving it for a trip to Atlantis in April and now was insisting I take it for my fundraiser. On Sunday, he had a friend over and they were playing in his room. I heard the friend say repeatedly "This one...this one" and it went on and on. After about 30 minutes of listening to that, curiosity got the best of me and went into his room to see what in the world they were up to. His friend was going through all of his toys and they had made two stacks. One he was was to keep and one he said was to sell at a garage sale he wanted to raise money for my fundraiser. The same Power Rangers that had slept in his bed with him and comforted him through nightmares and bathed with him time after time were now in the "sell" stack. he was even making a price list and he was blissfully unaware of the current economic crisis because a marble cost $5.00 and a Star Wars bobble head was $10.00. His enthusiasm and desire to help me raise money for a good cause really put it in perspective for me that I needed to give this everything I can and 5am bike rides to train or "pounding the pavement" to raise the money is so insignificant because it was not only making a difference to someone stricken with a blood cancer, it was making a difference to my stepson!

More blogging to follow as my training gets underway. Click here to donate to my cause.

Cathy Speizman
Broker/Realtor
Dickens-Mitchener & Associates
704.258.1391
cspeizman@dickensmitchener.com