Sledgehammer, Please to be Meeting Hope.

Wow. I mean, just wow.

Remember this post where I suddenly found some perspective and realized that complaining about not getting into a very competitive program was perhaps a bit counter-productive and that I have a lot of things that many people would kill for?

Well, to drive the point home, I present the following youtube video:

Erica is a student at the fine institution that I have been complaining so bitterly about being rejected from. And she has leukemia. I’m sure that Erica would willingly switch situations with me right about now. The universe. It’s about as subtle as a sledgehammer.

I don’t know Erica personally, but I’ve seen her around campus. And, from my brief google-stalkage, she seems like quite the person. And I mean that in the very best way possible. She seems like someone that I could really get along with. She is definitely intelligent and articulate. The universe. It’s about as fair as the refereeing at a Harlem Globetrotters game.

Fletcher is organizing a bone marrow donor registration on Wednesday and I fully intend to go and get my cheek swabbed. I highly doubt that my whitey mcwhitersteinness will be a match, but you never know. I’ve always intended to register to be a bone marrow donor. I’ve read about how important it is. But, like flossing, it’s something that’s slipped under my radar countless times. I see a billboard about bone marrow registration, I think “I really should register for that” and then, in classic Hope fashion, I get distracted by something shiny and I forget all about it. Well, on Wednesday, there will be a table outside my class with swabs and forms to fill out and nothing is going to distract me this time.

I watch that video and I think, “Wow, that could be my sister.” (Erica is singing with her own sister, Jaci). I would give my sisters my bone marrow in a heartbeat. I’d give them a kidney without hesitation (they can have the right one, the left one is slightly springier). My sisters are welcome to any of my organs that I don’t need to, you know, live. I would give my sisters the shirt off my back, the shoes off my feet, my very last dollar. All of these things would be easy: because I love my sisters fiercely, unhesitatingly, unconditionally. What would be hard? Having to watch my sisters go through a life threatening illness and not being able to help them. That, for me, would be a torture that I can’t even begin to fathom.

So, please, if this blog post has in any way, shape or form affected you, please, please, please… think about registering as a bone marrow donor. It’s a pretty big commitment. If they find out that you’re a match, it involves a trip to the hospital, anesthesia and a pretty big needle (although the needle part is not so bad, you’re asleep for that bit). But, you could end up saving a life. Who knows? The life you send could end up being somebody’s sister (Or brother. Or mother. Or father. Or best friend. You get the picture).

To up the ante a bit, anyone who sends me proof that they went and registered will get a shipment of cupcakes from me in whatever flavor their hearts desire. That’s a promise.