Melinda Marchiano's Blog
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Mar.05.2010
Now that I have completed the photo selections and permissions for the new edition of Grace, I am working on obtaining book endorsements. With the "Lance stories" in Grace, not to mention the treasured inspiration he unknowingly blessed me with during my cancer battle, I would love to...
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Mar.04.2010
I am hoping you took the time to look at Alese Coco's Web site, www.fight2win.org. It is because of people like Alese that I am able to cherish my good health today. (And also Dr. Dan, Cottage Hospital, and, and, and...!) What she has begun will help so many other children who suffer from this...
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Mar.03.2010
Were you watching American Idol last night? Wow, wow, and I am not talking about the show itself! What a surprise, and somewhat of a shock, to see the www.fight2win.org commercial asking for funding for research for Hodgkin's disease. The girl in the hospital bed looked just like I did two years...
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Mar.02.2010
Surely it seems that people are exceedingly busy. I am no exception. Juggling AP World History, AP Biology, Honors Pre-Calculus, Spanish II, pre-AP English, Nipomo High Dance Company, dancing six days a week, and getting the new edition of Grace ready for publication has me up late at night and...
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Feb.25.2010
Some thoughts about Lance Armstrong from Grace:
It was now August, and I finally finished Lance Armstrong’s book, It’s Not about the Bike. Okay, he was, officially, the coolest person on the globe, and my total hero and inspiration. I learned that Lance and I have a lot in common, more than...
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Feb.22.2010
A feeling of pride came over me as I flowed among the slow-moving crowd of purple t-shirts. On the back of each one was written, “Survivor,” and I was one of them. Each person in the sea of hope, who walked around the school’s track, held their own story of downfall, battle, and victory. ...
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Feb.18.2010
From Grace:
"Ah... there's nothing like being concerned about another person to extract you from your own self-pity."
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Feb.17.2010
Have you ever reached the very end of what you believe to be the sum total of all of your strength (physical or emotional,) and found that somehow, somewhere, you can find more when it is for someone you love?
From Grace:
"We could summon no power for ourselves, yet we somehow managed to ...
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Feb.16.2010
I want to share a bit more from the story of my Boston Ballet audition a year ago... I did get the leotard right this year! Don't you love how we live and learn? Sometimes learning comes the hard way, like the story that follows. Mylene, Mara, can you relate?
From Grace:
Wow. They were...
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Feb.15.2010
Just a bit more of writing and dance for my newly found author/dancer friends...
A year ago, I went to San Francisco to audition for the Boston Ballet summer intensive program. I was still very sick, recovering from cancer treatments and suffering with an eating disorder. I describe myself then...
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Feb.12.2010
This has been an exciting week! My book has been accepted for publication by Greenleaf Book Group, and it will be distributed through Emerald Book Company this summer. What an awesome opportunity this is for me to be able to collaborate with their incredibly talented staff!
When I was diagnosed...
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Feb.11.2010
I found our awkward relationship hysterical and couldn’t help but do some harmless teasing. Putting on my best disgusted, threatening expression, and using my perfected New York dialect, I huffed, “Get outta here, ya Ketamine pusha!”
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Feb.10.2010
Wow. It dawned on me. I had cancer. That was the first time that anyone, Dr. Dan, nurses, friends, or family, had ever used that word to refer to my illness. I think that it was probably avoided and aimed more toward Hodgkin. Hmm, that sounds like a cute, little puppy with floppy ears,...
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Feb.09.2010
Probably one of the weirdest things is having people stare at you as you roll by. They hesitantly peek, as though they are expecting a mangled, undistinguishable thing to roll past. They sure did get a surprise when I went by, smiling and waving at them. Yeah, I milked that stretcher ride like...
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Feb.08.2010
With one already down, I chugged another nauseating bottle of oral contrast. For those of you who are not familiar with this delightful substance, I shall describe it to you. It comes in a clear, glass bottle... one that makes you believe that the milkman just pulled up in his horse and buggy,...
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About Melinda
Melinda Marchiano lives in the rolling, oak-studded hills of the Central Coast of California. Homeschooled up until high school, Melinda had the freedom to write and to create from a young age. Now in high school, she is academically at the top of her class...
Connections
Causes Melinda Marchiano Supports
Teddy Bear Cancer Foundation
Children's Miracle Network
American Cancer Society Relay for LIfe