Touching

This email was sent to me from my friend Dave and it was sent to him from a guy named Marc. This story is so touching and I am overwhelmed with the generosity of someone that does not even know me. I hope you all find this story as touching as I have. It is nice to know that even with the world as crazy as it is that there are good people still out there.

Greetings! Hope you all are getting through the winter without too much hardship. I seem to recall just a few months ago that we were all talking about how Global warming was making it such a mild winter....HA! So i'm going to warm things up a little on Wednesday March 7th, when I take the stage for the first time as a "Featured" singer/songwriter at Maynards, Sit N Bull Pub Open Mic Night. The show begins at 8PM with each open mic artist playing anywhere from 2 - 3 songs. Then I take the stage between 9 and 9:30 to perform a half hour set. During that set i'll be performing some of my originals with a few covers thrown in here and there to save you from the torture :D. I'm honored to have my neighbor, friend and guitar mentor, Jeff King backing me on Guitar and vocals. Now for the serious bit. As is customary for feature acts at Open Mic events, the hat is passed to collect money for the "Feature" who are typically starving artists. In my case you all know that I am neither starving nor an artist by profession, so I don't want your money. However, I know someone who does. You all may remember Westboroughs' David Rubensteins challenges when he was diagnosed with scleroderma and his insurance company refused to cover the cost of experimental treatment. Fortunately for David the outpouring of support from the community was able to raise enough money to pay for his treatment and he is now thankfully recovering at home. Scleroderma is a disease which hardens the soft tissue of your body and organs. There is no "formal" cure, but experimental treatment involving bone marrow and stem cell transplant is working but not covered by most healthcare insurance providers. To learn more about this disease go to http://www.scleroderma.org. You can read about David's progress in his blog by going to http://www.helpdave.org. In his blog David has identified another person Devona Coulson of Hewitt, Texas who is suffering from the same disease and is also in need of donations to help pay for the costs of her treatment and expenses. If you are able to come out on Wednesday March 7th, please give generously when the hat is passed because it could literally save a life. If you donate cash I will donate everything to Devona. If you want to bring a check please make it out to "Benefit Account for Devona Caulson". If you can not attend but still wish to make a donation you can donate on line at http://www.transplantfund.org. Just type "Caulson" in the Patient Website box on the left to get to Devonas personal donation page. I hope to see you on the 7th, The Sit N Bull offers great food, cold beer in addition to some pretty good entertainment. Add good people to the mix and how can you go wrong! If you need directions, you can get them from the Sit N Bull website at http://www.sitnbull.com.

Good news

Ok, so I have been waiting for what seems like forever to get my stem cell transplant underway. Thanks to the generosity of my dad and Jo, I am able to start the process. My friends and family have supported me and my sometimes questionable attitude. It has been hard to sit and wait, but I have managed to do so with a pretty good mentality. I am thankful that my mom is willing to give up her vacation and sick time to go with me to Chicago for 3-4 months. I know it is not going to be easy for her, but she is willing to do so without a second thought. I would like to say thanks to Joe for taking the time out of his Friday mornings to go around to the differetn businesses to collect the money from my jars. My sister Rona is going to go up with me for the 4 day testing period which is March 26-29th. The hospital team wants me to stay there and wait for the test results which takes 5 days, but I would rather come home and spend a week with my family. I do not want to stay in a hotel room for 5 days with nothing to do. I am so going to miss my little Taliyah and I hope she is able to visit me at least once with Faith.
There are a few people besides my family that I want to mention:
1. Ang and Dom for always being there and helping through my bad days and helping me have good days.
2. Dave and Robbi. Dave just underwent a stem cell transplant and has been an inspiration to me. I feed off his courage and strength and he has helped me with fundraising. He is an Angel in my eyes and God put him in my life for so many good reasons. Check out his blog and leave him messages, it is good to hear from people and please keep his family in your prayers. See him at http://desktopdavid.blogspot.com/.
3. All my family and friends who have helped me keep it together and raise money to save my life. Especially Elena G, Ciao Bella, Tracy G, Meredith G, Steph and Dawn, and Kim E.
4. Nancy B who has also had a stem cell transplant and is doing well. Thank you for your support and for taking the time to talk to my mom and ease her fears.
5. Rona's boss for donating airline tickets for us.
I hope and pray none of you ever have to go through this or anything similar to it, but if you do I will be here to help in whatever way I am able to. I will be posting things on here during my process. So keep this site in mind starting March 26 and on.
I love you all and I thank you again for all your support. I am truly blessed and thank God for all the wonderful people and opportunities that have come into my path.

Devona