At my Bat Mitzvah (a Jewish coming of age ceremony), I had to choose a theme, and I chose the color pink. I picked this color because it was my favorite color at the time and I liked the meaning behind it, and as I learned more about it, I fell head over heals for it.
Then I decided I would wear it on my body every day and the rest is history.
Six years, two thousand one hundred and ninety days, I, Sarah Ellen Goldblum, have worn the color pink. Some people hear this and think, oh my god she’s crazy. Or, wow that’s a really cool fun fact what happens when you stop wearing it?
Then others ask me, "WHY?"
I wear the color pink for people with cancer. Cells fatally cloning, I wear it for hope of a cure occurring. For the ones that were taken too soon by the grasp of a tumor, for the innocent children that only know pain and torture as their bodies turn on them.
Cancer has overtaken our world leaving everyone affected by it in pain, distress, fear, and sadness.
It’s time that we stand up.
It’s time that we fight.
It’s time that we find a cure.
When people find out the reason behind me wearing the color pink their reactions differ. Some people are speechless, others look at me in the light of inspiration, and then I guess you could figure what the remaining ask, "WHY?"
Everyone has been affected by cancer, the way that I was affected was through my grandmother. She was told that she had six months to live when I was five. Six months came and went and she was still there, months turned into years and my grandmother lived them to the fullest that she could.
Eight years went by and she died in the month of February at the age of 74. My grandmother was taken from my family at a young age, her battle ended to soon, a battle that shouldn’t have been.
Cancer sucks the life out of its victims, like the climax of winter on the rose petals; it wants us to hibernate to ignore the damage it produces.
I’m done hibernating, I’m done watching the roses wither, I’m done letting cancer win.
I wear the color pink for people with cancer, I wear it for those I know and those I don’t. I wear it for the children and the parents. I will continue wearing the color pink until there isn’t a reason to wear it.
I’m ready for a change, I want cancer to be a definition in a textbook for my children to read about how it was cured...not an illness my children will have.
We all have the opportunity to make a difference, to change our world for the better. It’s time to eradicate cancer from our lives.
The winter is ending and it’s time to wake up from hibernation.
