Day 1 and 2 of the Tour

My first day on the Pink Heals Tour started in my home city of Memphis, TN. We started the morning out with a police escort to WREG channel 3 to appear on Live at 9. Todd Conklin of the Memphis Fire Department did a live interview talking about the tour (which he was just leaving and I was taking his place) and also about our event at Dobbs Ford for Pink Heals Memphis. After leaving the station we did a caravan to Hope Lodge. Now when I say caravan, imagine 9 MPD motors along with 3 pink fire trucks. The trucks that we had were named Karen (she pulls the stainless steel ribbon of hope), Tonya, and the Lower Alabama Chapter truck named Cindy. As we pulled up to Hope Lodge you would not even know what it is from looking at it from the street. The great people from the American Cancer Society built a home  where cancer patients from anywhere outside of a 40 mile radius can stay for free for as long as they need to while going through treatment for the cancer that they are battling. The place was beautiful. They did an amazing job setting up a home away from home.

    After leaving Hope Lodge we traveled to the other side of Memphis to visit the West Clinic. At the West Clinic they have a foundation called Wings. Wings is an awesome organization that takes care of cancer patients. We toured the chemo floors where we were able to visit with patients that were there for their treatments. The rooms lit up when they saw all of us walk in and start passing out hugs and spending a few minutes talking to all of the patients. We were told that they see about 500 people a day come through the doors for treatment.
     Now let me tell you why we went to those places. Here in Memphis all of the different fire departments sell pink shirts. 100% of the proceeds from the shirt sales are donated to those 2 different entities. It was great seeing where the money goes from our fundraising efforts.

Day 2
     Today was a travel day for us. I now know what that means. We started the morning going to Graceland to take a few pictures. From there we headed south on I-55 down to the Desoto Civic Center. Where we did another photo shoot for the other part of Pink Heals Memphis fundraiser. On Oct. 29 we are painting the rink pink. Its the RiverKings first home match of the season. Proceeds from tickets sold through the Pink Heals Memphis website will be donated to the 2 places that I mentioned before. After both stops we proceeded down I-55 again this time to make a quick stop in Grenada, MS. There we met some great people that were survivors and others that cancer have affected in other ways. I can tell you that the stories that I heard brought tears to my eyes. As I told the few that I had the opportunity to speak with that I was from Memphis each one told me a story about a lady named Ms. Linda. Come to find out Ms. Linda was able to stay at Hope Lodge while doing treatments and she also was doing her treatments at the West Clinic. The 2 places that we in Memphis raise money for. After hearing all of this it gave me goosebumps and gave me a sense of pride for what I am doing on Tour but also what we are doing back home. After staying there for a little over an hour we started our journey back up. We continued on to Beaumont, TX. As I was driving Karen I had cars passing me waving and giving thumbs up to me. That gave me even more encouragement on what I was doing.
     We finally arrived in Beaumont at 1030pm. I am exhausted from the drive. Driving a fire truck can be tough but pulling a trailer behind it with the Ribbon of Hope is down right nerve racking. Going through construction zones where the lanes narrowed, I felt myself holding my breath doing it. Well its now after 1am and we have to be up at 7am to get ready for tomorrows event at the Fire Museum in downtown Beaumont. Tomorrow will be busy but its for the good of delivering Love and Hope to those that are fighting and to those that have won, but most of all being able to help those that have lost loved ones know that we care. Its what we as fire fighters do. We help others. For more information you can visit the following links:

www.pinkhealsmemphis.com or www.pinkfiretrucks.org