Weekly Round Up

Time for the weekly round-up of blogs.  These are the posts that have moved me, taught me something, inspired me, and which I’ve wanted to share with you. Just click on the highlighted links to read the posts. Don’t forget if you have written a post which you would like readers to see,  just leave a comment below. 

Ok everyone, get ready, you know it’s coming – PINKTOBER! There is no escaping it.  But the bloggesses aren’t about to stand by and drown in a sea of pink without putting up a fight.

Renn asks in The Hunt For Pink October,  “who chose pink as the color of breast cancer anyway?” and goes on to say that if you  want to see real breast cancer pink, “check out a sistah post-surgery. No matter the color of our skin, our scars are the same: pink.”

Jackie is all tangled up in pink and sums up pretty much how I feel too when she says: “I don’t have that much to say about Pinktober other than I’m already tired of it and don’t like feeling (self-induced) pressure to write about it.” Nancy shares something of Jackie’s feeling too in her latest post, although, in the end, she had plenty to say 🙂

Jody wants to upend pink  and Gayle Sulik, author of the seminal work on the whole issue, Pink Ribbon Blues, will be blogging 30 Days of Breast Cancer Awareness – a challenge taken up by Being Sarah too, who has committed to a blog post a day for October.

If just one thing encapsulates  for me, what Molly Ivins calls ” massive amounts of no fun”, it’s Rachel’s searingly honest accounts of the reality of metastatic cancer. In her latest post, she is angry that many of the magazines which are taken over with pink fever every October “contain absolutely not one iota of useful, educational, scientific, newsworthy, actionable, impartable or realistic information about breast cancer, period. But there (are) plenty of coupons for pink products and lists of stockists.” (Check out ihatebreastcancer for more on metastatic breast cancer awareness too).

A slightly different perspective from Philippa, who, from her corner of the world,  raises an important point that the  reality for many women around the world is that the need for awareness and treatment is in fact urgent and the whole debate around pink October has no relevance.

I have only touched on a fraction of what has been written about what Bringing Up Goliath calls pinkertising in her latest post, so please do leave a link in the comments below to any others I may have missed.

So Pinktober aside, what else has been happening in the BC blogosphere?

Lauren’s daughter Amelia Hope has written a sweet and moving guest post for her Mom this week and I can see that in “The Infamous Pink Cowgirl Boots” she has certainly inherited her Mom’s writing talent!

Catherine is in the woods at her aunt’s cottage, spending time with family, and reflecting on the simple, but powerful ways we can give back and support each other.

Turn your back for a minute and look what you miss! It has been two weeks since I have been able to catch up properly with everyone’s blogs and in that time, Terri has set off on a whole new adventure – check it all out on her wonderful blog A Fresh Chapter. 

This week we were left saddened by the death of Steve Jobs from pancreatic cancer, and Anne Marie reminds us that the same disease also stole the life of another great man –  cell biologist Ralph M. Steinman, who was awarded the  Nobel Prize posthumously this week for the discovery of dendritic cells. I was struck by Nancy’s reminder in her comment that the “loss of every life from cancer is sad, and at a time like this I also find myself thinking about those more “quiet losses.” How true! Nancy of The Pink Underbelly also writes a moving tribute to Jobs – check it out here.

And how true that cancer doesn’t discriminate – it doesn’t care whether you are young, old, male, female, rich, poor – it will take what it can, where it can. Brenda knows just how indiscriminate this can be, as she is left devastated at the news that one of her beast friends has been diagnosed with breast cancer: “Naively, I hoped I’d taken the “hit” for all of the women I love, but cancer doesn’t work that way.” As soon as I read Brenda’s words, I felt a pang of recognition. I think deep down I feel the same way too.

Finally, in case, we feel October has been completely hijacked by Pinktober, a gentle reminder from Stephanie in her Cancer Free Friday post (I love that idea Stephanie!);  Jan in Octoberfest – An Awareness of Another Color” and  Debbie of Where We Go Now, of the joys of the autumn season.

I love the quote that Debbie uses and I can’t think of a nicer way to end this week’s round-up than by sharing it with you:

October is the fallen leaf, but it is also a wider horizon more clearly seen. It is the distant hills once more in sight, and the enduring constellations above them once again. ~ Hal Borland

Wishing you eyes to see beyond the horizon this weekend.

Love Marie x