Pink for October

October is National Breast Cancer awareness month.

Pink for October is a website movement/trend designed to raise awareness of the issue of breast cancer:

"Web sites will Go Pink during the month of October to bring attention to Breast Cancer Awareness Month, get people talking about breast cancer, and raise money for research.

But to be clear, raising money isn’t the primary purpose of this web event.

The hope is that you turn your site pink (in whatever way works for your site), go out to that World Wide Web thing (in fact you’re on it right now!) and educate yourself about the multiple issues related to Breast Cancer, then take that newfound knowledge and tell someone else what you’ve learned."

Breast cancer, or any kind of cancer really, has the potential to devastate lives in ways that only those whose lives have been touched by it can truly begin to understand. It's not an old woman's disease, as many women my age like to think it is.

Nor is it merely a woman's disease, as many men seem to think it is.

I'd be surprised if turning my site pink has any large effect on breast cancer awareness among my circle of friends. However, just as that article I carried around with me for two years before I finally had the growth along my eye checked, maybe this change will prompt one person to have a check-up that will extend his/her life for another few decades.

Maybe that person will be me.