San Diego Susan G Komen 3 Day Breast Cancer Walk |theDALEYlife.|

I believe the photo above fully encompasses the feeling behind the Susan G Komen 3 Day walk. This is just one of the thousands of stories behind the participants of the walk. I do not know this woman, but seeing her push a wheelchair through the homestretch of 60 miles with a huge smile on her face perfectly describes what the 3 Day is really about.

This past year was a tough one for the foundation. Everything now days is politicized and people speak out on things they really know nothing about (myself included.) While the Susan G Komen foundation does raise a LOT of money for cancer prevention and research, ($6.5 million this year!) money isn't what the walk is about. The walk is about remembering loved ones who have lost the same battle. It's about the unity of people whom have traveled the same dark journey on their own, that come to celebrate the life they fought for together on these three days in November.

It is about the father and daughter who cheer the walkers on in remembering their wife and mother. A woman that participated in the walk until she lost her own battle years ago. The little girl seeing her memory of her mother in every walker that passes by doesn't let the importance of these three days pass her with age.

It is about the woman who stopped and cried when she saw my daughter, all dressed in pink and excited to hand out ribbons. My daughter, whose innocents doesn't yet understand the complexities of the real world and the pain of losing someone, but could understand the saddess in a strangers face who saw the resemblance of her own daughter in my little girl. A daughter she lost to breast cancer and the reason she walks year after year.

It is about the man who use to hold his wife and daughters hand in this walk, but now walks it alone with their faces on his shirt and the footprints of their memory in each step he takes. 20 miles a day. Three days in a row.

The 3 Day is a parade on the doorstep of the devil. A festivity; a reminder that it can take away body parts, it can take away money, and time spent in and out of hospitals. But it cannot take the will to live and the determination to fight. Cancer may win a battle, but people are doing everything in their power to win the war.

While standing in the streets and watching each of the walkers go by, limping and smiling through the blisters and sores,  I thought of something my Aunt Kay once told me as a child. I was a young boy when she lost her battle with cancer. Along with her I lost a little bit of the ignorance of my youth. It was the first time I heard my father cry and the first time someone who held me and cared for me passed away. We were sitting outside in the backyard and I asked why I could see so many more stars in the sky at her house than at my house. She said, "it takes all of the worlds darkness to make the smallest of stars shine bright"

Thank you a TON to everyone that donated throughout the year to make this year's walk a success, the Daley's GREATLY appreciate all of your friendship and support!