It was a beautiful day in the neighbourhood.

The daughter and I got to the Jog for the Jugs early. After I had written the names of all the people I was limping for on my tee shirt, I wandered over to the Wall of Hope so I could make up a pink card for them as well. One of the volunteers watched the long list of names scroll down the card and remarked that breast cancer has really touched my life.

For a split second I tried to organize in my head how to explain to this woman that I didn't know any of these people but through the wacky randomness of the internet my life had intersected with theirs. I couldn't. Even I don't exactly understand how it happened, but I am grateful that it has.

You know, I get these periods of almost smothering darkness from time to time. I'm guessing it's hard-wired into me, part of the legacy of being the granddaughter, daughter and sister of suicides. As the spousal unit jokes, I tend to see the cloud in all my silver linings.

Lately a lot of things have come together that make me feel as if I'm living in an endless thunderstorm. Stuff in my personal life, things I see on the news � I have been struggling with a molasses like sadness.

And then on a glorious fall morning in Montreal I got to be part of 12,000 people who reminded me that compassion, generosity, humour and hope are still very much a part of what we are, even if we don't seem to see much of it on the news right now.

Breast cancer. That one out of nine number means that few women are going to make it through their life without having the illness touch them, a family member or someone they know.

The Jog for the Jugs is a reminder of the best side of human nature. It is a loving remembrance of the people we've lost, a celebration of the people who have survived, and walking proof that not only do we as a species never give up, that despite what we see on the nightly news we are capable of what I think of as the big ones: faith, hope, charity �

And humour.

While I was in Montreal I got to meet the lovely, the charming Mysteria who took me to Nocochi where we sipped hot beverages, gabbed, and ate the tiniest, most perfect cookies on the planet. How teeny?

I have sneezed stuff that was bigger than these cookies. Seriously. (And really, no need to thank me for that image. I can feel your gratitude from here.) But they were so exquisitely beautiful and so tasty that their smallness somehow seemed right�eating a normal sized version of one of these cookies probably would have made me explode with happiness. This way, the bliss was controllable.

As she and my daughter (who is far closer in age to Mysteria than I) stood at the counter and chose our cookie goodness I was reminded once again about how the internet breaks down many barriers�age, gender, nationality, beliefs. For all our differences, we also have a lot in common.

It's easy to forget that.

Especially when you're looking at two zygotes pouring over a cookie counter and feeling oh, approximately 93.82 years old. Part of me is grateful that Kaffy's e-mail program decided my invite to tea was spam and that CF was too busy to visit. Hanging out with three zygotes would have probably driven me to start looking into moving in to a nursing home.

All in all it was a good weekend indeed. I'm grateful to my three loyal readers for supporting a well run charity and pushing me out the door away from my personal pity party and into the sunshine.

I needed that.

--Marn

Here are the Generous Souls Sponsoring me to Run to Limp the 2004 Jog for the Jugs In Montreal on Oct. 3, the few, the proud, the Bazonga Boosters:

Mileage on the Marnometer: 714.28 miles.
Oh man. This is going to be hard
Goal for 2004: 1,000 miles - 1609 kilometers