Caterina Scorsone being interviewed by Citytv about The Good Neighbours' Club

“I like your Santa Claus, Joe,” I said of the pin attached to the pocket of a man I’d just met at The Good Neighbours’ Club, a day club for older men who are homeless or marginally housed.

“I love Christmas” he said, grinning ear to ear. “I’ve been a member of the club for years and I come every December 25. We both do,” he said pointing to a friend sitting across from him who was clearly more interested in the turkey and stuffing than conversation. “it’s wonderful,” Joe added.

Joe wearing his Santa pin

The Good Neighbours’ Club is open 365 days a year, and gives an important sense of community for those who don’t always know where they’ll be sleeping next. The club provides showers, laundry, an address for mail, a place to lock up any valuables, food, clothing, companionship and compassion.

For this Christmas dinner, there were some special surprises, including Caterina Scorsone, one of the stars from ABC’s Private Practice, who served meals to club members. The Good Neighbours’ Club is one of Caterina’s favourite charities, and she had this to say to people about it:

Caterina’s father, Dr. Bruno Scorsone, is the executive director of the Club. He was there with the volunteers, including members of his family, and took time out of the busy Christmas day to talk about why the club is so important to so many:

Volunteers came from all over, including from the congregation formerly lead by Dr. Rev. David Bruce, who is now on staff at The Good Neighbours’ Club. And 50 gifts arrived, donated by the Toronto Police Service and distributed to the men by lottery drawn by Lauro Monteiro who oversees logistics at the club. The police often extend kindnesses to the club. Toronto Police Chief William Blair is The Good Neighbours’ Club vice patron. Lt. Governor David Onley is the Club’s Patron.

Volunteers including Cateraina Scorsone and members from Dr. Rev. David Bruce's former congregation

When the media showed up to do a story about Christmas at the club, Alex, Ray and various other members of the club were grateful for the opportunity to tell Canadians how important the club is to helping them back to a better life.

GNC member talking to the media about how important the club is

People have pre conceived ideas on who may hit times hard enough to use a food bank, become homeless, or need the services of The Good Neighbours’ Club. It’s an irony not lost on many of the members, some of whom were high earning professionals before bad luck, bad choices or bad health brought them to the land of need.

It happens.

I’ve met men there who achieved more in their careers than I could ever hope to but who now rely on The Good Neighbours’ Club for food and clothing. You might think they’d be bitter, but mostly they are grateful that they have somewhere to go every day of the year when they need it, even Christmas.

Members of The Good Neighbours' Club at Christmas dinner

Just because they are homeless or marginally housed does not mean they are without community. They have one, and the club is its hub. If someone hasn’t been by in a while, someone will check up on him. When the body of an older man with no ID turns up, GNC staff and club members help the police figure out who it might be. And when one has good fortune, he tries to help his buddies.

It’s a phenomenon Judy Graves, the recipient of the first Good Neighbours’ Club’s Paul Croutch Award for her work advocating for Vancouver’s homeless, knows very well. She discovered she could not effectively get a vulnerable man housed if he was worried about the friends he was leaving behind to the streets. She had much better success when she could say, “I have found housing for you and for a number of your friends – go round them up.” Then they would go with her.

Homeless advocate Judy Graves with Gerald

There was a recent study that suggests that those experiencing poverty can better recognize and respond to signals of distress in others, leading them to act more kindly and compassionately in certain circumstances. As the study’s lead author Jennifer Stellar said, “These latest results indicate that there’s a culture of compassion and cooperation among lower-class individuals that may be born out of threats to their well-being.”

I can’t speak to the study, but I can tell you that the men at The Good Neighbours’ Club are gentlemanly in an old world way. They hold the door, many of them stand until a lady is seated, and they offer what little they have as a token of thanks for anything you do for them. And when I am in the middle of the room with a perplexed look on my face (a look that I wear a lot regardless of my surroundings), someone inevitably offers help.

Today it was Joe, who volunteered to watch my video gear as I suddenly realized I could not be in two places at once, and had to leave my equipment behind.

When I got back, Joe decided it was time to move on. He didn’t stay for the raffle of the gifts donated by the police. He was there for the food and the companionship, and it was time to give his place to another. Let someone else enjoy what he has already known, and let another more in need have one of the 50 presents to go round.

Joe was content.

Almost.

On his way out, he pressed something into my hand, smiled and said “Merry Christmas.” I opened my hand to find the Santa Claus pin he’d been wearing, the one I’d admired.

Now he was content.

And I who came to give of my time left with far more than I came in with.

Merry Christmas, Joe. Merry Christmas.

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2. Caterina Scorsone is a Good Neighbour Toronto born,  LA-based Caterina Scorsone prepared for her role as...
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But she did go, urged on by the memory of Megan’s last days, during which time Megan asked her parents and friends to keep her work raising awareness for childhood cancer research going.

I am forever in awe of the childhood cancer families who work so hard to raise money and awareness to fight the diseases that their children battle(ed). It is agonizing and exhausting for them at times I am sure. And yet they must, because, for some, the only thing worse than sharing their story is not sharing their story.

For those in the battle, research is the only hope. A solution could come soon, perhaps in time for their child. It was only a generation ago that childhood leukemia claimed something like 80 per cent of sufferers. Now the numbers are reversed and climbing, with more than 80 per cent of those battling childhood leukemia surviving. I’ve heard the number quoted higher than 90 per cent in some circles.

These families would almost all rather be doing something else. Most are unpaid, and all are so very tired from the additional burdens that fighting childhood cancer has put on them. They are absolute heroes in my eyes.

None of this takes away from the vital work being done by professional fundraisers, marketers and public relations folks at any medical, research institution or drug company doing what they can to fight childhood cancer or any other disease for that matter. Goodness knows, I am one of them from time to time, and I have been inspired and humbled by extraordinary professionals doing everything they can to advance the cause.

But in my books, the families are heroes of the highest order. There is no profit to be made by drug companies to research certain diseases, all too often, childhood cancers. That’s not a dig. They are businesses and their responsibility in the world as it is now is to make money for their shareholders, and not to solve the world’s ills. It costs billions of dollars to create new drugs, and the money they’ll get back from creating drugs to treat certain childhood drugs won’t cover the investment. So setting up and funding research facilities has actually fallen, in some cases, to families.

Families put their exhaustion, their personal pain, their incredible fear of what might come or grief at what has already transpired aside to work for a day when no one else might endure what they have faced or face now.

And if that isn’t the mark of a hero, I don’t know what is.

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He was one of Reader’s Digest Heroes of the Year, named in 2007 for the previous year, along with four others, including Stephen Lewis. His name is Brandon Schupp, and when I met him via Mary Lye and David Stones then at The Childhood Cancer Foundation, Brandon was 13, and wanting to climb a ten thousand foot mountain on behalf of the ten thousand kids in Canada living with cancer. He did, becoming a media sensation, garnering 10′s of millions of media hits and featured on Canada AM 3 times in the span of a few weeks, including from the top of the mountain.

Brandon had been inspired to do his climb by his young friend and neighbour, a little boy who battled neuroblastoma, one of the deadliest of childhood cancers. He tragically lost his battle last year.

Brandon is now 18 and every bit the young man we all believed he’d become. He is going off to college, preparing for what he hopes will be a career in policing. He’ll be a brilliant cop. He is quick on his feet, a pragmatist, and cares about youth. I know this because, good man that he is, he and his mother come visit me once or twice a year, where we get caught up on life and Brandon’s plans for the future. This time, dear friend and colleague Deborah Keegan was also able to join us.

The tradition started when he was 14 and Brandon, of his own volition, saved up his allowance so he could come into Toronto to take me for lunch to catch up for a visit. I can tell you, no lunch ever tasted so good. He is a remarkable young man from a wonderful family, and I am grateful that Brandon and the Schupp-Freeman family have become and remained dear friends over the years.

In Brandon, as in so many of the youth with whom we are privileged to work, I see great hope for the future. And he will be a great future cop wherever he ends up.

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The odds were against Megan McNeil even leaving the hospital when she was first diagnosed with adrenal cancer at the age of 16. Megan, however, wasn’t going to go without a fight, and fight she did, not just for herself but for the hundreds of scared kids she’d met in the childhood cancer wards and the thousands she’d never meet face to face.

But they knew her. Because she wrote the childhood cancer anthem that got them through dark, lonely nights in hospital measuring the time by the clicks and beeps of the machines attached to their small bodies.

Childhood cancer is not for the faint of heart. It destroys whole families. It robs them of everything they were and thought they would become. It puts lives on hold, crushes careers and finances, and robs them of each other.

Most marriages fail and the rate of siblings suicide is staggeringly high.

Amidst all that despair was Megan’s voice, pure and honest, and a song that gave families battling childhood cancer hope. Because when your kid is fighting for life, hope is in rare supply and high demand. It is what gets you through the next appointment, the next heartbreaking decision, the fear, and even the loss.

Megs was fearless. She made a bucket list and crossed everything off she could, including bungee jumping, ziplining and parachuting.

And she told her story over and over again to the tens of millions of people who got to know her through stories done on her by media outlets around the world.

Everyone loved her. Because she was generous, real, and just as concerned about other kids on the childhood cancer journey as she was about herself.

Her story was named one of the best of 2010 by Canada AM and the most inspirational story of the year by CBC’s Connect with Mark Kelley. But none of that ever went to her head. And she worked to get her message out, even when she hurt, was tired from the treatment or just plain wanted to pull the covers over her head and forget she had cancer.

She did it because she had a mission. And a belief that we would one day soon live in a world where children didn’t die from childhood cancer. A world where:

• soon, enough money would be pumped into the woefully underfunded field of childhood cancer research;
• drug companies would realize that while there are no profits to be made in curing childhood cancer, saving whole families from the despair of childhood cancer is profitable in other ways and;
• bureaucrats in Canada would have the courage to say childhood cancer deserves its own month in Canada the way it has in the States.

She believed and the world wanted to believe along with her.

And now that Megan McNeil has died, it will fall to other desperately ill children and their families to try and raise the money they need for life saving research. It will fall on other small, frail shoulders to push the government for Childhood Cancer Awareness Month in Canada (it exists in the US but not Canada) and to beg drug companies to invest in research that will likely not make them a profit.

10,000 Canadian childhood cancer families, inspired by Megan’s courage, have no choice but to pick up where she left off and fight for the lives of their kids.

Our hearts ache for her parents, Dave and Suzanne, who stood at her side because that’s what good parents do. What kind of strength does it take to support your daughter when her biggest goal is to grow up?It takes the strength of a Megan McNeil. And we know where she got it from.

As a gesture of remembrance, the family has asked that you please share The Will to Survive Video with friends and family you treasure. The link is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9pHISnIj2Y

And please download The Will to Survive from iTunes to help her in her fight to end childhood cancer and support two of her favourite causes, The James Fund and BCCCPA. The link is:

http://itunes.apple.com/ca/album/the-will-to-survive/id378380828

To learn more about Megan McNeil and The Will to Survive, please visit www.willtosurvive.org

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Discovered by top producer, Megan McNeil’s “The Will to Survive” captured hearts
across North America and gave hope to many

January 29, 2011 – Vancouver, BC – Megan McNeil, 20, a singer who captured the hearts of North Americans with her song about what it’s like to be a kid battling childhood cancer, has died. She had battled Adrenalcortical Carcinoma since she was 16.

Megan wrote The Will to Survive to lift the spirits of other kids in the chemo ward.  When legendary music producer Garth Richardson (Hedley, Rage Against the Machine) heard it, he knew he had to be the one to produce it, and a campaign to raise awareness to fight childhood cancer was born.

Canada AM selected Megan’s story one of the best of 2010 and CBC’s Connect with Mark Kelley selected it as the most inspirational story of the year. Tens of millions of people throughout Canada and the US learned more about childhood cancer thanks to Megan’s song and media campaign, and news features on her appeared as far away as England and Russia.

Megan is survived by her parents Suzanne and Dave McNeil. No details about a celebration of Megan’s life are currently available but will be made known when they are available.

The family is requesting privacy at this time but they have issued the following statement:

“Our daughter was our hero.  She taught us the meaning of bravery and inspired us every day with her own Will to Survive. She wrote her song as a gift to anyone who needed to be picked up on a very bad day. And when you are a family fighting childhood cancer, there are a lot of very bad days. We are so grateful for the many who have reached out to let us know how much her song meant to them. And we are so glad she was, and is, our daughter.”

Megan was clear in her final hours that she wanted her campaign to go on because, as she said, “Too many kids have died from childhood cancer and it’s got to stop.”

Megan considered it her personal mission to tell the world how terribly underfunded research is into childhood cancer. She also wanted everyone to know that research into adult cancers does not do much to help kids but research into childhood cancers helps everyone, including adults.

Proceeds from “The Will to Survive”  go to childhood cancer organizations, including The James Fund for Neuroblastoma Research, which funds the James Birrell Laboratories at The Hospital for Sick Children and its research into neuroblastoma, one of the deadliest childhood cancers; and BCCCPA. The Will to Survive is for sale on iTunes and also on Amazon.com

BCCCPA, founded in November of 2002, is a registered non-profit charitable society whose mission is to provide financial support to families of a child with cancer and raise awareness for children and youth with cancer and blood disorders. BCCCPA’s Family Financial Aid Program is a prime example of how some of this support and awareness is designed and delivered. Other BCCCPA activities include annual grants to childhood cancer research projects along with advocacy for initiatives and programs that help to enhance the quality of life for children and youth with cancer and blood disorders.

The James Fund was established by the family of James Birrell to generate funds and knowledge leading to new therapies for the treatment of patients with neuroblastoma, one of the most frequent cause of disease-related death in children. James died of the disease in 2001 at the age of 8.  James Fund researchers are recognized globally, and have taken the top neuroblastoma research award in the world. The James Fund and its benefactor, The James Birrell Research Laboratories at The Hospital for Sick Children, are considered by many as the best hope kids battling neuroblastoma have. To date, seventeen research projects have been funded, twenty-five papers published, a drug-testing unit has been established, eight international collaborations are underway, and a new clinical trial is  bringing new hope to the parents of children suffering from this terrible childhood cancer. Hollywood actor Tom Hanks is its Honourary Patron.

There is a Facebook Page called I want to give children fighting cancer The Will to Survive where fans can post their messages to the family. The website is www.willtosurvive.org and the video in support of the song is at http://www.youtube.com/user/GottheWilltoSurvive#p/a/u/0/Y9pHISnIj2Y The song can be purchased on iTunes at http://itunes.apple.com/ca/album/the-will-to-survive/id378380828 and on Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/The-Will-To-Survive/dp/B003T5FR1K/ref=sr_shvl_album_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1281311518&sr=301-3

-30-

NOTE TO EDITORS: B-ROLL, ART AVAILABLE. “THE WILL TO SURVIVE” YOUTUBE VIDEO IS CLEARED FOR BROADCAST.

For Further information, please call:

Susan McLennan (416) 699-1846 or cell: (416) 568-5974 or email: susan at babbleoncom dot com

Deborah Keegan (416) 691-5168 or cell: (416) 525-5177 or email: deborah at babbleoncom dot com

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Battling an aggressive cancer for the fourth time in four years, no one could blame now twenty-year old singer Megan McNeil if all she thought about was herself. But that’s not Megan’s style. Megan wrote the beautiful song The Will to Survive to help other kids on the chemo ward on bad days. And when you’re a kid fighting cancer, there are a lot of bad days.

Megan has campaigned tirelessly for the cause of childhood cancer, appearing in print, on tv and radio talk and news shows across the US and Canada. And even when press want to focus on her personal story of incredible resilience and hope, Megan is quick to turn the spotlight on other kids and the organizations she is using her song to support:

The James Fund, one of the leading funds in the world fighting neuroblastoma, a leading cause of death by disease in children (Honourary Patron: Tom Hanks);

BCCCPA, The BC Childhood Cancer Parents Association which provides financial support for the families of children battling cancer;

Solving Kids Cancer, who fund, find and manage solutions to improve the survivorship of kids battling cancer.

It’s not always easy for her to do. Some days she hurts. Some days, she doesn’t feel like telling her story to one person, let alone a million people who might be watching her on TV or listening to her on the radio. But she does it anyway because she has a message and she knows that no one can deliver it like she can.

Megan, kids fighting cancer around the world thank you for what you’ve done, and what you are about to do. We can’t wait to tell the world about all the big things coming your way in 2011.

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The post immediately below is from July 2010. There is a more recent update on Megan McNeil and her legacy here.

Megan McNeil is sending a message of hope to all kids battling cancer and hopes you’ll do the same.

Megan is 20 years old and has been battling a very aggressive form of cancer since she was 16. She wrote a beautiful song which has been featured in media outlets around the world called The Will to Survive to give strength to other kids, particularly littler kids, who were in cancer treatment with her.

Megan hopes that this September, people support childhood cancer organizations. She has selected The James Fund and BCCCPA, two organizations that she believes are great beacons of hope in the darkest times of childhood cancer.

To learn more about Megan McNeil and The Will to Survive, please visit www.willtosurvive.org

To book an interview with Megan McNeil, Garth Richardson, Ryan McMahon, The James Fund, BCCCPA, or anyone else involved with The Will to Survive, please contact:

Susan McLennan
susan at babbleoncom dot com
416.699.1846

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The United States Consul General cordially invites you to uncork California’s sunshine in a bottle at the 2010 California Wine Fair. And as if FABULOUS wine weren’t enough,  iconic rockers Nickelback and Three Days Grace have thrown in a little song, by way of signed guitars they are donating for the Silent Auction. Tom Hanks, Dolly Parton and The Kratt Brothers have also donated autographed items.

Date: Monday, April 19^th, 2010     Time: 7:00 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.

Place: The Fairmont Royal York                                                Admission:
The Canadian Room                                                                           • General Ticket Price $ 65.00
100 Front Street West                                                                       • Wine Club Members $ 60.00

Toronto, ON

The James Fund for Neuroblastoma Research will be operating a silent auction at the event. Also, $40 from every ticket purchased through The James Fund will go to the neuroblastoma cause.

Enjoy a unique opportunity to sample a wide selection of more than 400 premium wines from 125 of California’s top producers at this event, the largest tasting tour of California wines in Canada! And know that you’re helping fight one of the most deadly forms of childhood cancer that there is.

To purchase tickets, please complete and submit to one of the following:

1. By fax to (705) 749-6907
2. By email: Scanned forms can be sent to diana.birrell@jamesfund.ca
3. By mail: The James Fund, 625 Whitaker Street #4, Peterborough, On  K9H 7L5

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