Endurance

Please forgive the blog vacation. Between working two shows for the Cape Playhouse, night school and training, there was precious little time for anything, let alone blogging. So much has gone by, I will endeavor to keep this one brief and not dredge up too much past.

Most importantly, the latest Honor Roll members:

NOLA STUDIOS and the incomparable TUCKER JOHANN, who lets me keep all my stage management crap there for weeks
MICHAEL McGRATH and TONI DiBUONO
ROBERT MUFFOLETTO
SUZANNA HAY and BRAD BELLAMY
and GREG COHEN, who I met in college and now he's not only running the marathon, he's also running for Fred's Team.

bringing the total going to the Aubrey Fund for Pediatric Cancer Research to an amazing

$2,475

Thank you all so much for your support. Every dollar, every step, is in honor of Liam Witt and his fight to overcome neuroblastoma. Won't you help me honor this brave little boy and help others fighting childhood cancer by donating to my Fred's Team effort? Simply click here or on the links on the side and bottom of the page.

Liam update: he went home after an extended stay in the hospital to get his blood count up. He will most likely begin his second round of chemo this week. Mom Gretchen's birthday was this past Wednesday and she has a special birthday wish, which I would like to share with you:

If every person who reads about Liam e-mailed us to tell us they want to hold a bake sale, we would easily surpass that number. If each of those people convinced two of their friends to join the cause and hold their own bake sale, then we’d really be getting into some impressive numbers. If we can sell 96,000 cookies in a few weeks, why couldn’t we hear from 100 people who want to hold a bake sale? And the bigger those numbers are, the more we can fight back against pediatric cancer. I hope my birthday wish comes true. I need my birthday wish to come true.
Gretchen
You can email her at gretchen.holt@gmail.com

I have been training hard. High -- or low -- lights include: twisting my ankle during a step workout two weeks ago (and it's still sore. I've been to see Dr. Rock, who says it's just a sprain and to wear an ankle brace with velcro straps to provide support,) two gorgeous long runs on the Cape, one of which inadvertantly turned out to be a little longer than expected, a couple of brutal training sessions, and a long-awaited return to steno day classes.

I did not like going to night school. Nothing wrong with the teachers, only that steno only meets twice a week at night (4x a week during the day,) and between everything else I wasn't getting the practice in. I am continually amazed at the night students, however, most of whom normally hold full-time jobs and many of whom also have family obligations. How they find the time and energy to do night school and get through steno is impressive. I couldn't do it. I am motivated, but not to that extent. My brother, on the other hand, went to law school at night while holding down a full-time job and raising a family and also being an observant Jew. Did I mention he graduated Magna Cum Laude? Top of his class?

But I endured. Every time I started to fret about having no time to do anything, I thought about Liam and Gretchen and all their family is going through. I thought about my brother and how he maybe slept 4 hours a night for 4 years. And I endured. When we're doing a running drill and I'm tired and in pain, I think about Liam, and I endure. And ultimately, enduring is not about getting by, it's about getting through. It's gritting your teeth and bearing it when your body is telling you to stop. And that's what I'm going to do, grit my teeth and push past the pain, the doubt, the frustration. And I'll come through the other end a better person.

In the meantime, I need to learn how to bake cookies.