Jimmy V Foundation all about Love Living and Fighting Cancer

Please read this, it's not about sports I promise. ESPN radio and I have an umbilical cord between us. It's says about the times we live in that I live here in Manila that I can honestly say that. Now the consequence of that addiction is I have these multitude of voices in my ear one to five days a week , year round. But anybody can give you sports or politics . What makes you as a listener loyal to a voice on the radio and Howard Stern has proved this, is to have that person talk about your personal life.

One of my motivations as a writer is provide an outlet for what touches me both good and bad. because if it touches me then maybe it will touch you. Just maybe your day will be different. Then in turn you can make the day of other people around you different.

Cancer touches everybody. It just does. I have had this good friend for twelve years and she lost her mom late last year. She was so full of life. I remember telling my own mom that this person was really " ka sadya " in the Ilonggo sense of the word even though she was Irish Canadian. Somebody who always cracked you up. It was hard reading about her gradual deterioration but it's flattering when someone trusts you enough to share that pain with you through a series of emails.

Sometimes adversity brings out a strength and will in people that will never surface in times of content and tranquility. Jimmy Valvano was handed what turned out to be a death sentence. What touches people 15 years later is what he did with that death sentence. What he did not do is throw a pity party . He put in the building blocks for the foundation that bears his name today. I will attempt to give you today what Jimmy V decided to do with his death sentence. When you see what he did and the fruits that bore from what he did, his death sentence did not end with a period.

Anyway Thursday morning at my desk, I have tears in my eyes listening to the different people and their winning bids and their reasons for doing what they do. The annual fund raiser for the Jimmy V foundation. I provided the audio clip about a father's fight and the effort to stay postive , too awkward to describe anyway. I may provide the file for the whole show but in the meantime you can get it HERE . Make sure you get the July 16 2008 show. Again about 2 or 3 people worldwide read this column anyway so I "reward " you about real life things like crying in my desk. At least the desk itself is enclosed.

Of course as I write this my thoughts turn to people taken by cancer and family we lost for whatever reason. Tita (Aunt) Vicky was hard to take. There was the time we first heard the news. The symptoms first started showing up during a long weekend back in 2003. I was not there but we were vacationing in the same place. Then the roller coaster ride that lasted 2 1/2 years .

I remember my dad getting the call when we were in a taxi in Bangkok that she was better. This was during their visit to Stanford (June 2004 Palo Alto , California). We were relieved but sometimes those feelings don't last. I remember Christmas 2005 being particularly bleak for her but she was able to overcome that hurdle. I know I was drained and it's not like I had first hand view of it. She finally succumbed April 13 ,2006 which was Holy Thursday here. Her funeral was the following Sunday. Below is the bookmark they gave out that day. i don't know the origin exactly but it could not be that well known since it did not show up on Google so I typed it out.

Moments in Life

There are moments in life when you miss someone so much that you just want to pick them up from your dreams and hug them for real!

When the door of happiness closes, another opens; but we often look so long at that the closed door we don't see the one which has been opened for us.

Don't go for looks , they can deceive. Don't go for wealth , even that fades away. Go for someone who makes you smile to make a dark day seem bright. Find the one that makes your heart smile.

Dream what you want to dream; go where you want to go; be what you want to be, because you have only one life and one chance to do all the things you want to do.

May you have enough happiness to make you sweet , enough trials to make you strong, enough sorrow to keep you human , and enough hope to make you happy.

The happiest of people don't necessarily have the best of everything; they just make the most of everything that comes along their way.

The brightest future will always be based on a forgotten past. You can't go forward in life unit you let go of your past failures and heartaches.

And while you have the your time and before you go , thank God for all the people who have come your way ; show your appreciation , your love.

To those who have touched your life in one way or another; To those who make you smile when you really need it; To those who make you see the brighter side of things when you are really down; To those whose friendship you appreciate; To those who are so meaningful in your life ;

I hope I did.

Vicky

Vicky Benares Jalandoni

Feb 18 1950 - April 13 2006. Don't count the years , count the memories!

Well since I spent enough time on her decline I prefer to end my recollection of her with some fond memories. Memories that have come back listening to the Jimmy V speech.

• mid 70's in Fabrica, Negros. Coming from the beach and something was wrong with my feet. I remember seeing Jelly Fish right on the beach and I was scared I may have stepped on one. She was sympathized with me.
• 1986 she went to Vancouver for Expo. I remember we chatted with her asking me if I felt Canada was truly home.
• 1997 My cousin Rissa got married and we were in LA and San Fran. She learned from me two trivial things but she treated it like the Dead Sea Scrolls. 1) a short pencil is better than a long memory. A philosophy a high teacher had that has served me well when I was wise enough to use it. 2) We were stuck in traffic in the highway outside San Fran and I told her the term "rubber necking" the phenomena of a traffic jam caused more by people slowing down to look at the accident than the actual accident itself. Not sure why she got a kick out of those things but as you can see, I treasure the memory.
• 2001-2005 - She was a semi regular at our office. There were more than a few times I should have been at my post but I was talking to her. One topic we always enjoyed was talking about Angela's kids. I remember I told her Matthew's first name for me was "EEEEEEEEEEEEE" . She then said "I want him to know me so he can give me a name". I also told her about when Andrew was really young but I was astounded when he wanted to look at the digital camera monitor to see how the picture turned out and she enjoyed the thought of this little boy coming to that level of awareness and deduction.
• Her last message to me was relayed by my Ninoy Benny. How she appreciated me looking to see if she was there at her usual desk. Of course I did not want to think of anything as "last". Denial was there until the actual end.

Memories from four different decades. Impacted on me by Tita Vicky. You know what was another layer of sad in the Tita Vicky story? For the second time in my life I saw a mother bury her child. I hope it never happens to any of you but if it has or does you will definitely get a sympathetic ear from me. Unfortunately I have seen it twice since then.

Valvano received a lengthy standing ovation after the speech you will see, hear and read about. .He died less than two months later after a year-long battle with cancer. I hope somehow his "mind, heart and soul" has somehow in some small capacity lived in me the last few days I have been working on this multimedia piece. I know without a doubt it made the others that were claimed live again even though it comes at the price of some sadness. If you were patient enough to read all I had to say and allow Jimmy V to touch your heart like it has mine , thank you. Should you feel moved enough to spread the word by linking my piece or making a donation to a cancer foundation you may not have or by being extra caring to one you know. Don't talk about me, I have done nothing. I am just a blabber mouth who can type. Talk about Jimmy V, talk about ESPN keeping his message alive well past his death. Play the audio files , watch the video and share it with others . So that at least we can do our small part to prove the end of his speech true.

Ed

Ed

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/jimvalvanoespyaward.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Valvano

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePXlkqkFH6s

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/mp3clips/sportsspeeches/jimmyvespyy77.mp3

Thank you very much. Thank you.

That's -- That's the lowest I've ever seen Dick Vitale since the owner of the Detroit Pistons called him in and told him he should go into broadcasting.

I can't tell you what an honor it is to even be mentioned in the same breath with Arthur Ashe. This is something I certainly will treasure forever. But, as it was said on the tape, and I also don't have one of those things going with the cue cards, so I'm going to speak longer than anybody else has spoken tonight. That's the way it goes. Time is very precious to me. I don't know how much I have left, and I have some things that I would like to say. Hopefully, at the end, I'll have something that will be important to other people too.

But, I can't help it. Now, I'm fighting cancer, everybody knows that. People ask me all the time about how you go through your life and how's your day, and nothing is changed for me. As Dick said, I'm a very emotional, passionate man. I can't help it. That's being the son of Rocco and Angelina Valvano. It comes with the territory. We hug, we kiss, we love. And when people say to me how do you get through life or each day, it's the same thing. To me, there are three things we all should do every day. We should do this every day of our lives. Number one is laugh. You should laugh every day. Number two is think. You should spend some time in thought. And number three is, you should have your emotions moved to tears, could be happiness or joy. But think about it. If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that's a full day. That's a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you're going to have something special.

And so, I can't help -- I rode on the plane up today with Mike Krzyzewski, my good friend and a wonderful coach. People don't realize he's ten times a better person than he is a coach, and we know he's a great coach. He's meant a lot to me in these last five or six months with my battle. But when I look at Mike, I think, we competed against each other as players. I coached against him for fifteen years, and I always have to think about what's important in life to me are these three things. Where you started; where you are; and where you're gonna be. Those are the three things that I try and do every day. And you know when I think about getting up and giving a speech, I can't help it -- I have to remember the first speech I ever gave.

I was coaching at Rutgers University, that was my first job -- oh, that's wonderful [reaction to applause] -- and I was the freshman coach. That's when freshmen played on freshman teams. And I was so fired up about my first job. I see Lou Holtz, Coach Holtz here. What was it like, the very first job you had, right? The very first time you stood in the locker room to give a pep talk. That's a special place, the locker room, for a coach to give a talk. So my idol as a coach was Vince Lombardi, and I read this book called Commitment To Excellence by Vince Lombardi. And in the book, Lombardi talked about the fist time he spoke before his Green Bay Packer team in the locker room -- they were perennial losers. And I'm reading this and Lombardi said he was thinking should it be a long talk? A short talk? But he wanted it to be emotional, so it would be brief.

And here's what he did. Normally you get in the locker room, I don't know, twenty-five minutes, a half hour before the team takes the field; you do your little X's and 0's, and then you give the great Knute Rockne talk. We all do. Speech number eight-four. You pull them right out, you get ready, get your squad ready. Well, this is the first one I ever gave. And I read this thing -- Lombardi, what he said was he didn't go in. He waited. His team was wondering: Where is he? Where is this great coach? He's not there. Ten minutes -- he's still not there. Three minutes before they could take the field Lombardi comes in, bangs the door open, and I think you all remember what great presence he had, alright, great presence. He walked in and he just walked back and forth, like this, just walked, staring at the players. And he said, "All eyes on me." And I'm reading this in this book. I'm getting this picture of Lombardi before his first game and he said "Gentlemen, we will be successful this year, if you can focus on three things, and three things only: Your family, your religion, and the Green Bay Packers." And he...like that...And they knocked the walls down and the rest was history. I said, that's beautiful. I'm going to do that. Your family, your religion, and Rutgers basketball.

That's it. I had it. Listen, I'm twenty-one years old. The kids I'm coaching are nineteen, alright? And I'm going to be the greatest coach in the world, the next Lombardi. And...I'm practicing outside of the locker room and the managers tell me "you got to go in." "Not yet, not yet"... family, religion, Rutgers Basketball. All eyes on me. I got it, I got it. Then finally he said, "three minutes," and I said "fine." True story. I go to knock the doors open just like Lombardi. Boom! They didn't open. I almost broke my arm. I was like...Now I was down, the players were looking. Help the coach out, help him out. And now I did like Lombardi, I walked back and forth, and I was going like that with my arm getting the feeling back in it. Finally I said, "Gentlemen, all eyes on me." These kids wanted to play, they're nineteen. "Let's go," I said. "Gentlemen, we'll be successful this year if you can focus on three things, and three things only: Your family, your religion, and the Green Bay Packers," I told them. I did that. I remember that. I remember...where I came from.

It's so important to know where you are. And I know where I am right now. How do you go from where you are to where you wanna be? And I think you have to have an enthusiasm for life. You have to have a dream, a goal. And you have to be willing to work for it.

I talked about my family, my family's so important. People think I have courage. The courage in my family are my wife Pam, my three daughters, here, Nicole, Jamie, LeeAnn, my mom, who's right here too. And...that screen is flashing up there thirty seconds like I care about that screen right now, huh? I got tumors all over my body. I'm worried about some guy in the back going thirty seconds, huh?

You got a lot, hey va fa napoli, buddy. You got a lot.

I just got one last thing, I urge all of you, all of you, to enjoy your life, the precious moments you have. To spend each day with some laughter and some thought, to get you're emotions going. To be enthusiastic every day and [as] Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "Nothing great could be accomplished without enthusiasm" -- to keep your dreams alive in spite of problems whatever you have. The ability to be able to work hard for your dreams to come true, to become a reality.

Now, I look at where I am now and I know what I wanna to do. What I would like to be able to do is to spend whatever time I have left and to give, and maybe some hope to others. Alright, Arthur Ashe Foundation is a wonderful thing, and AIDS, the amount of money pouring in for AIDS is not enough, but it is significant. But if I told you it's ten times the amount that goes in for cancer research. I'll also tell you that five hundred thousand people will die this year of cancer. And I'll also tell you that one in every four will be afflicted with this disease, and yet, somehow, we seem to have put it in a little bit of the background. I want to bring it back on the front table. We need your help. I need your help. We need money for research. It may not save my life. It may save my children's life. It may save someone you love. And it's very important.

And ESPN has been so kind to support me in this endeavor and allow me to announce tonight, that with ESPN's support, which means what? Their money and their dollars and they're helping me -- we are starting the

Jimmy V Foundation for Cancer Research. And its motto is "Don't give up, don't ever give up." And that's what I'm going to try to do every minute that I have left. I will thank God for the day and the moment I have. And if you see me, smile and maybe give me a hug. That's important to me too. But try if you can to support, whether it's AIDS or the cancer foundation, so that someone else might survive, might prosper, and might actually be cured of this dreaded disease. I can't thank ESPN enough for allowing this to happen. And I'm going to work as hard as I can...for cancer research and hopefully, maybe, we'll have some cures and some breakthroughs. I'd like to think I'm going to fight my brains out to be back here again next year for the Arthur Ashe recipient. I want to give it next year!

I know, I gotta go, I gotta go, and I got one last thing and I said it before, and I'm gonna say it again: Cancer can take away all my physical ability. It cannot touch my mind; it cannot touch my heart; and it cannot touch my soul. And those three things are going to carry on forever.

I thank you and God bless you all.

files available here