Relay For Life Tab on the Home Page

I want to publicly thank the board for creating a Relay For Life tab in the upper right corner of the home page. That was a super classy thing to do.

Anyone visiting geocachingmaine.org can simply click that icon and go directly to our Relay page to join the team, make a donation, or find out what Relay is all about. If you know anyone who has had cancer, and I'm betting you do, you can appreciate how important this is. Relay is the largest private fundraiser in the world and the money goes directly to research and direct programs for cancer patients. A scientist right now is doing research on brain tumors down in Jackson Lab in Bar Harbor thanks to a $750,000 grant from the American Cancer Society. 44 Nobel prize winners have gotten their start with ACS money. The breakthroughs in treatment modalities have been unbelieveable in recent years.

Our Maine Geocachers team has done very well raising money by sending out emails to their friends and family asking for donations. Quilting Mom and Hollora made a beautiful quilt that was raffled off and Hollora had other nifty money raising ideas. We set up our campsite on the track Friday afternoon this June 3rd, tent out overnight, and head home on Saturday morning. Different members will take turns walking the track all night. There is entertainment, moving ceremonies, food, etc. It's a wonderful and memorable experience.

Throughout it all we are there with our geocaching sign telling people who ask us what geocaching is all about. We're Maine geocachers...out in the community...doing good things...showing the world that geocachers care.

I invite you to click on the tab and see what this is all about. I also invite you to join us, or simply donate to the Maine Geocachers (either to one of our team members or to the team in general). And thanks again to the board for the very nice tab on the home page.

Oh Dan - this post made me melt. I have been there from year #1 with the Team and can not make it this year! I will donate though ~ AND ~ Ralph is registerd for the Survivor Lap!!!

What does Relay mean to me - well, it means a lot! The year I started Geocaching just less that 3 months after my first find - my husband was diagnosed with colon cancer. So what? Well, it was being able to go out and find a cache on a break from visiting him at the hospital, being able to go find a cache while he recovered, being able to find caches together after which made a difference. That and many, many friends met along the way.

Relay allows me to give back a very small portion of the support I have felt. No - I can't walk all night - but I can ask friends to give me a buck or two for the cause. I can sew a quilt square, I can buy some pink rubber duckies to sell, I can donate a dollar or two myself.............and it all helps.

So - although I am not a team member this year - won't you PLEASE come walk just one lap with Ralph and me??? He is signed up - and all going well will be there to walk a lap with me as a survivor this year!

And if you can't...........isn't that lap worth just a $10 donation to the Maine Geocaching Team???? Please consider helping them make goal and keep (believe it or not) among the top winning teams in the Hancock County Relay!

SO - let's all remember...............the many, many Geocachers and their families who have been afflicted or touched by this disease. There are many Relays but please give.

Lastly - I will be relisting a Gecoin on Ebay - donated by MaineFamily specifically for our Team - please consider bidding and bringing this home to Maine! Go Relay Team 2011!

Wow, this is a first. The first time my eyes have started to glisten as I read a post on geocachingmaine.org, Lois-Ann, you're the best!

Dan - I am no better than anyone who is here on GCM! I just passionately believe in what I do, my family, my friends, my hobbies, and the causes (note the s) which I support. Whether it is Relay or my Conservation Club (which gives thousands in scholarships), I try to explain the way I feel.

What many of the newer folks do not know is my partner, my best friend, my husband bought my GPSr for me Christmas 2005. I found my first cache in January 2006 and the madness began. THEN on Memorial Day Weekend 2006, Ralph was diagnosed with colon cancer during an Emergency Room visit and rushed to surgery. Our life was changed forever. What we did changed forever and what Ralph could physically do such as hiking and running changed forever.

Some would not believe this, but, it was Geocaching which got me through the emotional roller coaster ride of the next few months and years. It was Geocaching friends who became my new and extended family to talk to and who understood. And Ralph met everyone, and knew, no matter what his lot, I would be ok. He even began riding with me on occasion and sitting while I went to find the caches.

So many of you had been there - cancer had been OR WAS in your life too. And then, because of that little cache at Meadows Dam - EMSDanel came into the Geocaching World - and invited GMC folks to participate in the Hancock County Relay. Yeah - why not..........I now had a real reason to do Relay. Cancer was so real in my life I wasn't sure what to do.

Dan - I am not the best - I am just someone who has a great support network through Geocaching friends, knows how strong Geocaching can make you both physically but also emotionally and believe Relays will provide the financial support to change the outcome of the dreaded Cancer diagnosis. As a nurse who began hospital nursing in 1969, I could tell you unbelievable stories about the old treatments.

Rejoice in today's standards of care! Rejoice in today's support! Rejoice in knowing that our passion of Geocaching can help keep a caregiver's sanity while you wonder if your whole being is torn apart. That is how I feel. Not sure all of the caregivers out there feel that way but it sure helped me.

Hoping to walk with a few of you that Friday night in June ~ as a friend, fellow Cacher and care giver just supporting another cause!

The Geocoin will be listed on Ebay sometime this coming Sunday. I sell on ebay under hollora, just like my cacher name, so I am not hard to find. Please take a look for it - knowing the price paid will be donated to the Relay Team. Thank you!