Bow ties, bike flips and bAmazing donations (ok not a word, but I tried hard...)

So this week has been FULL of good news and I'm really excited to share it all!  The first good news was that Lizbeth's test results came back showing that her CA-125 tumor marker is down by 30%!  This is a good indication that the newest round of chemo is working to shrink her tumors!!  So awesome!  She is such a fighter and deserves to see that all of her efforts and the efforts of her wonderful doctors are working.  

The second piece of awesome news came from the president of my alma mater, Dickinson College.  To give you some background, President William G. Durden, also an alumnus, is pretty much a legend at Dickinson.  He's known for several things, including his love of one of our founding fathers, Benjamin Rush, his love of the phrase "engage the world!" and is INTENSE love of bowties.  

Doesn't he look dapper?!

Anyway, he's extremely smart, extremely driven, and extremely approachable.  I have many good memories of him from Dickinson, including his bow tie tying tutorials that would often run on the college tv station.  

On Thursday, I saw a post on Facebook from the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund, asking people to "like" a picture of an official OCRF bow tie so that OCRF could win a competition being held by BowTie Cause.  BowTie Cause is a foundation started by former NFL player Dhani Jones to support his friend who was battling lymphoma at the time.  The bow ties sold by BowTie Cause are all custom ties that represent a charity organization, and a majority of the proceeds from the sale of each bow tie go to the designated charity.

I thought about President Durden and his affinity for neck accessories, so I figured, what the heck.  I sent him an email, telling him about my experience at Dickinson participating in philanthropic work with my sorority, Kappa Alpha Theta, and how that love of service has stuck with me ever since.  I told him about Lizbeth, and what I was doing to help bring awareness to ovarian cancer research.  I also appealed to his good sense of fashion and asked if he would consider purchasing a bow tie to wear at one of his public events.  Well I truly almost fell out of my chair when not five minutes later, I got the following email back:  

Emily—thanks so much for your wonderful message and thank you for your engagement in issues that matter. Of course, I shall buy a bow-tie. Never been known to resist one! I am purchasing it as I type. All the best. BD

I was truly blown away.  For a man with a million things on his plate at all times to email me back so quickly with the promise of promoting this cause was truly humbling to me.  And THEN I got the following email just a few minutes after the first:

Emily—just ordered! BD

Just awesome.  I shared this with my fellow Dickinsonians, and everyone was just as excited as I was!  I have such a renewed sense of pride in my college and all that it stands for!  Look out for Bill Durden rockin' his OCRF bow tie at an event near you!!  Oh, and if you'd like your very own OCRF bow tie, you can purchase one HERE.  $39 of the $57 purchase price goes DIRECTLY to OCRF.  What a great gift for that stylish person in your life :).  

So more on why this whole bow tie thing is a really really big deal.  Just last year, FOX Sportscaster Ken Rosenthal started Bow Ties for Charity, and wore the bow ties of different organizations to bring awareness to each cause.  Check out a picture of him wearing the OCRF bow tie HERE!!  This year, the top four charities that have the most "likes" for the picture of their bow tie on Facebook will have their bow tie appear (on Ken, of course :) ) during this year's Major League Baseball World Series.  What an amazing opportunity to bring awareness to ovarian cancer!  

I'm asking you now, if you have Facebook (and I'm pretty sure the only people I know that don't have Facebook at this point are my parents, and that's ok with me...), please go HERE, and "like" the photo of the  OCRF bow tie!  We need as many likes as we can get to make sure that the good work of the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund is shown on televisions across the WORLD!!  Make it happen, people!


And last but not least, we are only $170 away from hitting the $2,000 mark for OCRF Team Hope!!  This is truly incredible considering this whole endeavor started almost exactly ONE MONTH AGO!!!  Sorry, I'm just a little excited about all of this :).  

If you haven't donated already, or would like to help us make the push to $2,000, please consider giving today.  If you have a friend or family member that you would like to honor, make sure to say so on the donation form and their name will show up on the wall of donors on my page.  Here's my fundraising link:  http://tinyurl.com/ccdzmf9

Ok ok really last but not least, I finished a 7 mile run this weekend at a respectable pace, so I was super pumped about that.  The weather was gorgeous and the fall colors are just starting to come out, so the conditions were just right for a great run.  We also saw some poor guy do a pretty skilful flip off of his bike into the woods while we were running.  No worries though, he popped right back up and was fine.  Dude should consider a career in stunt work!  

I hope you all had a fabulous weekend, and are looking forward to a promising week ahead!

Peace and love, 
Emily