Youthful Heroism Dressed in Pink

 My relationship with cancer is for the most part a repressed one.  I have it in my family; my grand-aunt, grandmother,  and other relatives had it, my father battled it for years, as well as some very significant friends of mine.  But, for the first time actually, I am acknowledging publicly that I've never really ventured into a real conversation about this neither with friends or family.  The platform just hasn't yet appeared to explore how I feel about it, how it concerns me, or influences my lifestyle choices, etc - and I don't even know the reason why - which on my worse days I judge quite harshly. I seem to face-off and blurt out all manner of things - but alas - this silent Machiavellian disease is a mum subject for me and I'll dare say for my loved ones too.   And while the title features the word 'heroism' - I must admit, this is as far as my valiant efforts will take me today, until I can rap on the door of this topic again with pink ribbon waving high. Til then, I wanted to do something here in the last days of this very important month, to share two somewhat related things I recently came across that inspired me and why.  

All stories from anyone whose life has been touched by cancer are rife with episodic or spasmodic, maddening reports of impossibly persistent fortitude in fighting it, or in soldiering on when it has robbed us of our cherished friend, cousin, sister, mother, brother, father, or child. There is always inspiration to be found in recounts of caregivers or receivers during this illness and its trying treatments; but there is also the most incomprehensible force of energy to be gained from any simple triumphant report over the powerlessness this disease seems to fabricate.

There are, in my estimation, two such examples below - each infused with beauty, a touch of the silly, with brilliant simplicity fused with complex imaginative victories...over what is, well...definitively destructive.  Art is creative, as is science, and the greatest abandon in creativity is often expressed youthfully - which has always been symbolised so perfectly by the pink ribbons we see everywhere during Breast Cancer Month. So while not directly related to breast cancer - I hope you see the connective tissue of these youthful forms of heroism.


Dedicated to us all - may we always imagine our way past the impossible. 

The Women Project::::by JR - 2011 Ted Prize Winner

"Women Are Heroes"

Website

Synopsis Excerpt: The Women project wants to underline their pivotal role and to highlight their dignity by shooting them in their daily lives and posting them on the walls of their country.

On the other hand, by posting the same images of these women in Western countries, the project allows everyone to feel concerned by their condition and connects, through art, the two different worlds.

Kenya, South-Sudan, Sierra-Leone, Liberia

"Could cancer be caused by the body's own repair system going awry?"

:::::::by Eva Vertes, a fresh faced 19 year old at the time of this talk, shows her genius creative curiousity in exploring how to cure cancer

Website for Molecular Biology, Princeton University

Eva Vertes is a microbiology prodigy. Her discovery, at age 17, of a compound that stops fruit-fly brain cells from dying was regarded as a step toward curing Alzheimer's. Now she aims to find better ways to treat -- and avoid -- cancer.   She asks this and other breathtaking questions in her conference-closing 2005 talk. Her approach marks an important shift in scientific thinking, looking in brand-new places for cancer's cause -- and its cure. Her ultimate goal, which even she calls far-fetched, is to fight cancer with cancer.