We Can Make It Happen

I hope that someday, somehow, melanoma will reach a “N.E.D.” status among the general public-- that is, “no evidence of denial”. No denial that melanoma really is cancer and that it’s quite deadly if not detected in its early stages. No denial of the breakable link between melanoma and excessive UV ray exposure, particularly from tanning beds. And no denial that melanoma is one of the Hotel Carcinoma’s ‘forgotten stepchildren’ when it comes to funding treatment research.

The “someday” part of the dream is largely beyond our control. But the “somehow” most certainly is not. It’s up to all of us who’ve already checked into the Hotel Melanoma to learn a lesson or two from the Pink Nation and speak out. Loudly and repeatedly. Even if we sometimes annoy those who are still in denial. And without apologizing for our advocacy. (Has any pink cancer awareness campaigner ever apologized to you for doing what they do?) Together, we can make it happen.

Once again showing my age, I’ll leave you with a new version of Chicago’s “Dialogue”…

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


Are you optimistic ‘bout the way tans are slowing?
No, I never ever think of it at all

Don’t you ever worry
When you see who’s getting browned?

No, I try to mind my business, that is, no business at all

When it’s time to function as a reeling cancer being
Will your endorsement from Oz help you get by?

I hope to deny further, a few more years or so
I also hope to keep a steady fry

Will you try to change things
Use the power that you have, the power of a million warrior pleas?

What is this power you speak of and this need for things to change?
I always thought that leather skin was fine

Don’t you feel tan sessions just calling C around?
No, the UV’s here are very good for me

Don’t it make you angry that C’s war is dragging on?
Well, I thought the evidence showed that C’s cured now, I don’t know

Don’t you ever see devastation from the UV’s salons give
All the needless cancer, all the needless pain?

I haven’t been checked lately, my health is just so fine
And my friends they don’t seem worried cause they haven’t caught black’s crime

Thank you for the talk, you know you really eased my mind
I was troubled by the shapes of things to come

Well, if you had my outlook your feelings would be numb
You’d always think that every tan was fine

We can make it happen
We can change the world now
We can save the children
We can make it better
We can make it happen
We can save the children
We can make it happen