Stand Up To Cancer

Frank McCourt

This week brought the news that Frank McCourt, author of Angela's Ashes, has passed away from metastatic melanoma. After moving from Limerick, Ireland to New York City at the age of 19, McCourt taught high school English for nearly 30 years before writing his childhood memoirs in his mid-60s. "I think there's something about the Irish experience -- that we had to have a sense of humor or die," McCourt once told an interviewer. "That's what kept us going -- a sense of absurdity, rather than humor."
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/20/books/20mccourt.html?pagewanted=1&em

Ryan Tomoff
Ryan Tomoff, a 14-year-old native of Annapolis, Maryland, has already faced cancer three times in a short number of years: his acute lymphoblastic leukemia, first diagnosed at the age of 2, has recurred twice, once in 2002 and again in 2004. Now Ryan is a regional ambassador for Hyundai's Hope on Wheels, which raises money for cancer research. Says Dr. Aziza Shad, chief of the department of pediatrics at the hospital where Ryan was treated, "He was a pillar of hope for himself, for his parents, and no matter what happened, (he) remained positive . . . He's gone back to a normal life and he gets the most out of life. It's a very thrilling feeling; it's a wonderful feeling to see him stand up there."
http://www.hometownannapolis.com/news/top/2009/07/20-25/3-time-cancer-survivor-shares-story-offers-hope.html

Pamela's Abuelita

In a comment on last week's edition of With You, We Stand, reader Pamela shared a link to a blog entry where she remembers her grandmother, who passed away from colon cancer in 2007. "My grandma isn't around to see how clumsy my daughter is, just like her mom," Pamela writes. "She won't be around for Natalie's quinceanera. She won't be sitting on the second row of her wedding. But I know that forever and always she'll be looking down at us smiling. This is who I'm writing for. This is my muse. My inspiration. My Abuelita."
http://pamelaperez.wordpress.com/2009/07/13/grandmother/

Adam Yauch
This week also brought the news that Adam Yauch, better known to many as MCA of the Beastie Boys, has cancer of the salivary gland. Yauch announced the news in a video posted to the band's Web site; their upcoming tour has been cancelled so he can undergo surgery for the rare, though usually curable, form of the disease. "It is a little setback, a pain in the ass, but this is very treatable in most cases," Yauch says in the video. "And they've caught it early, so that's the good news. So that's what's up."
http://www.webmd.com/cancer/news/20090720/beastie-boy-adam-yauch-has-salivary-gland-cancer

As always, we invite you to share the stories that inspire and motivate you in the comments below.