THON

In elementary school, my grandfather flew from China over to America for a year's visit. The first few months of his visit were fantastic. He practiced tai-chi in our front yard while the skittish neighbors in our white suburban town were convinced he was practicing voodoo. He planted vegetables in our garden, he learned some broken English, and he helped us with our math homework. Our neighbors, not prone to change, still reluctantly peeped outside of their blinds to make sure he wasn't putting a curse on our entire neighborhood.

They didn't know him like we knew him--
He loved one woman, passionately and unwaveringly, for 58 years of his life.
He was the best man I knew.
And he taught me the most important life lessons anyone could learn: he taught me how to love, how to forgive, how to be patient, how to grow, how to empathize, how to trust, how to be selfless, and how to see the best in every awful situation. My mother learned that from him, she taught that to us, and he reinforced it through example.

After 6 months in America, he started feeling weak. He had no appetite, but he convinced all of us that it wasn't anything big. My grandfather hated when people worried about him. When he left America, he lost over 100 pounds. He was physically and emotionally a skeleton of what he was when he first arrived.
It wasn't until he landed in China that he finally went to the hospital. He had late stage terminal cancer; it started from his lungs, spread to his colon, to his kidneys, to his blood stream. He didn't want anyone to worry, so he kept silent about all the pain he was going through. My grandfather passed away when I was 11.

At that point, I wasn't sure what it meant to have cancer. All I knew was the inconsolable regret and sadness my mother, grandmother, and aunts and uncle felt years after his passing.

Over the years, I've realized that cancer doesn't care. It doesn't matter what kind of person you are. It doesn't matter how many people love you. It doesn't matter if you're 70 or 7. It just shows up and takes over.

Cancer:
I'm hoping that one day my future grandchildren won't know what the word means.
One day, families don't have to see a loved ones suffer through chemotherapy and its after effects.
One day, children won't lose their parents, grandparents, siblings, best friends, cousins, teachers, neighbors, etc. to an illness that has no definitive cure.

This time next week, I'll participate in my last Penn State Dance MaraTHON as a student. There will be families in the Bryce Jordan Center that are going through or have gone through situations a million times worse than what my family had to go through.
My grandfather had his entire life to live; he had his entire life to love. These families have to see their siblings/children/grandchildren battle for their lives at such a young age. This is why I THON- everyone deserves a full, happy life. To be completely robbed of an opportunity to do so just isn't fair.

Still don't understand what THON is? The following video is THON; it is one of the proudest organizations I've been a part of so far in my life.




Donate for a cure. Donate for the kids.

Dance on!