It happened Saturday -- the third annual Yard Sale for the Cure. It took place in thousands of lawns all over Canada, and profits donated from the respective sales will benefit breast cancer charities. And it all started because of one breast cancer survivor's cluttered basement.Rachael Smith, diagnosed with breast cancer in April 2004 and in treatment for the nine months that followed, noticed before cancer that piles of stuff were gathering in the basement of the house she shared with her husband and two young daughters. A sale was in order, she realized, but then cancer arrived and a yard sale fell off her radar. And then she emerged from surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation and realized she had reason to give back to the community that helped her survive.
And so Yard Sale for the Cure was born.
Just two months after her mother lost her battle with gall bladder cancer, Liane was diagnosed with breast cancer. It all happened earlier this year -- and while Liane is still mourning the loss of her mother, she is also still managing the madness of her own disease. Liane is surviving with courage, with determination, with the same powerful spirit that powered her mother's fight.
I confess. I was once a sun worshiper. I grew up in Ohio where a really sunny day was rare -- so on the occasion when the sun was bright and hot, I was in my back yard or at a swimming pool or at a lake soaking up the warmth and comfort of the rays that mostly burned my skin but gave me a glow that eventually turned the slightest shade of tan and made me feel healthy. It's ironic really -- that I felt healthy when the act of sunbathing is so completely damaging. And I knew this at the time and for the many years that followed -- and I still basked in the sun and vacationed in Florida and sometimes actually drove in the direction of the sun on a overcast day, in search of a tan that was never fully achieved because my skin is pale and fair and was never meant for any amount of sun exposure.
