Last year during the month of October, I bought my dear Aunt Myrtice a pink ribbon Christmas ornament in recognition of her being alive at the age of 84, a year after she revealed to her children during the Christmas holidays that she had lumps in her breast. Those lumps were quickly diagnosed as cancer, surgically removed, and treated with chemotherapy. She won’t be around to hang that ornament this Christmas having died from a massive heart attack a few months ago.

But she lives on in me and other members of our family who she interacted with, loved, and influenced. I have a particular memory from my 60th birthday I’d like to share.

I traveled the 6 hours to visit my mother, arriving on Friday evening as she’s always liked so I could be there for “supper.” We are southerners, so that evening meal is not dinner at her house. Because my mother hadn’t been feeling well, I’d offered for my husband and me to stop and bring home dinner, but she wouldn’t hear to it.

When I arrived I found those two sisters cooking. My aunt didn’t think my mother was up to the task, so she came to help, bringing food she’d prepared at her house and pitching in to cook the rest. I believe she had just finished undergoing chemo—she was very modest about what was happening to her so she kept the details private as much as possible.

Knowing that they were both being challenged on the health front, but that they cared so much for us that they expended what little energy they had to cook supper for my birthday was an awesome outpouring of love.

That’s the kind of love I equate to the women in my family. Those I remember who have passed from this life and those who are still with us. I haven’t been at many family functions, due to the distance I live away from the home places, but when I hear about one of them, food is abundant. Love is poured out like autumn leaves flowing gently in the breeze away from their tree but never forgetting their origins.

I am truly blessed to have been born to this kind of love, to this kind of family. To have so many childhood memories of get-togethers where an abundance of home-cooked food was consumed after a blessing was said asking that it nourish our bodies and our souls.

I know my own children and grandchildren have been deprived of much contact with our deep roots, but I hope I have been able to pass along some of what it means to be connected. To stay connected. To put your last ounce of strength and energy into an expression of love for family.

My mother and my aunt symbolize a long line of strong, independent, faithful women who exhibit an amazing grace. They have inspired something in me that I feel every day, and I hope I can pass along at least once in my lifetime a gift so precious as that meal the two of them got together and cooked for my 60th birthday. I shall remember it always as one of life’s most precious moments.

October became Breast Cancer Awareness Month in 1985 as an annual international health campaign to increase awareness of the disease and to raise funds for research into its cause, prevention, and cure. The pink ribbon came to symbolize the fight in the late ‘80s.

One thing I’ve learned is that buying pink products really puts very little cash into breast cancer research; at best many of those things just make us “feel better.” I have a couple ideas that have the potential for a greater direct impact:

If you know a breast cancer victim or survivor, take her to breakfast, lunch, or dinner (or supper). That’s what I plan to do with my friend who has survived for 25 years. Or, take a pink bouquet to the hospital and place it in the surgical ward thanking the doctors, nurses, and technicians who care for patients with breast cancer (you could even consider giving a silk orchid from I-ShopTheWorld.com for something that will last). Or, make absolutely sure you know where your contributions are going and just how much is being donated from those pink products you just can’t resist.

And, by all means be self-aware and diligent about your own health and fitness. An estimated 182,460 new cases of invasive breast cancer are expected to occur among women in the United States during 2008. An estimated 40,480 women will die from breast cancer. Breast cancer is the second deadliest cancer in women (behind lung cancer).

Be aware, too, that although breast cancer in men is a rare disease, it can occur and it is often fatal. Less than 1% of all breast cancers occur in men. In 2005, when 211,400 women were diagnosed with breast cancer in the United States, 1,690 men were diagnosed with the disease. Make sure the men in your life are aware that it can happen to them.

By Linda Lee, Guest Columnist

Please find ways in which You may Help Us Support National Breast Cancer Awareness Month! at:

http://i-shoptheworld.com/2008/10/12/october-is-national-breast-cancer-awareness-month/

and Please Reply either here and/or in this previous posting referenced above with Your Stories of how Breast Cancer has affected Your Life and that of those You Love, ok?

We hope this all helps!

- The I-ShopTheWorld.com Global Family and The Virtual Consulting Firm