My Fundraising Weekend
I did it! I really did it!
On the 21 st June 2014 I walked 10 miles for charity, now this might not sound like it is a massive achievement but let me explain…. I am a 15 and half stone woman with a slipped disk and sciatica, my weight is partly the reason there is no image of myself either on my blog or web site. I live in hope that one day the weight will magically melt away from my bones leaving me with a svelte 10 stone slim trim beauty, but sadly so far the diet and fitness goddess is not listening to my weekly sacrifice and daily prayers!
Any way I digress and here is the serious part, last year I lost a very dear friend to cancer she bravely battled triple negative breast cancer for two years, the last time I saw this beautiful lady was at another friends wedding shortly before she left us, the memory is a treasured one, her husband tells her story so much more eloquently than I ever can, Jeff also is doing many exhausting sounding things to raise money in her memory, please do take a look at his just giving page, read how our beautiful lady "Emma" is remembered by a man who loved her deeply, it is moving stuff, if you can please feel free to donate a few quid, it will lift his heart more than you or even I really know. Emma spent her last weeks with her family in the loving care of our local hospice, those that were with her cannot speak highly enough of this wonderful place which takes a whopping £5 million a year to run of which only 20% is provided from the council, all of the rest has to be donated or raised through such activities such as the midnight memory walk which I took part in on Saturday night.
Thirty of us joined together to form a team; Em’s Angels we called ourselves and dressed in halo’s and tutu’s, I had to make my own tutu! Arriving at 9:30pm we started the evening predictably in the pub! Before duly registering our names at 10:30. The atmosphere at the stadium was electric, with over a 1000 walkers milling around we were all suddenly very grateful for our halo’s so we could spot each other in the crowds, the local radio station was there to keeping up spirits and photographers snapping away, our crowd of thirty or so woman and three men in tutu’s being quite popular. The zumba workout directly before a 10 mile walk was a bit questionable but we were definitely ready to go when midnight rolled around.
As it turned out and contrary to all our promises about sticking together and walking as a group proved to be quite impossible with a big group sprinting off at the start at a pace at least four times faster than I had any chance keeping to – hey ho, at least I wasn’t the only one and a group of us settled into a much more sedate pace at the back, at one point I could see the whole 1000 walkers snaking out in front of me as the walk went on, it was a magnificent sight.
I wont get boring with the low down about aching muscles and sore feet at each marker but suffice it to say that each mile marker seemed to come around predictably about ½ a mile after we all started to look out for it! About half way round the course I got a sinking feeling as my lift home was in the lead group…. Oooops! Thankfully she did wait and I did romp home to cheers although I can’t help feeling a little piqued that my bacon butty had been eaten by someone else! I had been looking forward to that since the 7 mile marker! Still I did get a cooked breakfast from my ever loving and suitably impressed husband at home.
We raised a fantastic 95 thousand pounds for Kirkwood Hospice on Saturday night, hats off to everyone who walked the distance, well done, I hope to see you again next year.