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Joan Snyder, no list of heroes would be complete without your name. I often read here to keep up with you and great people like Joe & Nina, but seldom post. I am glad to see you still active in PD advocacy. (and thanks to Ray who keeps us current through her posts). I have probably never told you this, but you were my inspiration to get involved in advocacy in the Parkinson community. I met you through dearest Brenda Tucker when PLWP was just starting up. I will bet you do not even remember our first meeting. I had been diagnosed about 4 years and had just gone on disability. Life did not seem to hold much of a future for me back then. But my how things have changed since that day! I journaled online for nearly 5 years. I would like to share my entry on the day we met; we were at Bren's house in Tennessee, and you were on your way to Morganton, NC to help build a Habitant for Humanity house. Here is my journal entry below: God bless you! Journal entry for Peggy June, 2000 "I don't believe in predestination. That is, I don't believe that every little event of life is predetermined by the Great Creator. But even He said that we are "predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of His will" (Ephesians 1:11). I do believe that there is a "plan" for each person . . . how one travels from point A to point B is up to individual. I crossed one of my pathways today. According to the free choice delegated a person, I could have chosen not to go down this pathway. But a believer or not, it cannot be denied that the events of the past few days are far too coincidental to not have been part of my "predetermined" plan. Our plan is revealed by the many opportunities afforded us in life. I call them those "open windows." If I go through one of those open windows and it's part of my predetermined plan, things really start clicking. Today, it became evident that I was headed down the right road. I had talked with Bren on several occasions through my journaling efforts with PLWP. Joan was also a journalist here, and I was keeping up with her story online. The e-mail from Bren arrived. Bren and I discovered that we were living only a 2-hour drive apart from each other. Joan and family were going to be passing through, and Bren invited me to join her in the meeting of these fellow PLWP's. That's when things started clicking. Everything fell into place, and the three of us met at Bren's. I arrived several hours before Joan, which gave Bren and me the chance to get to know each other. We sat in the sunshine of her beautiful back yard enjoying the picturesque view and chatting away as if we were high school buddies. We laughed, and we cried. The highlight of the day, however, came when Bren connected with her PLWP friend. Bren "talked" her right to her driveway via Joan's cell phone. "She's here!" yelled Bren as I washed up from cutting onions and tomatoes for our cookout. My heart thumped into my throat. I sprinted (as well as one can sprint with a cane!) to the front porch to see hugs and handshakes being exchanged. Then I heard Joan's sweet voice ask, "Where's Peg?" Our eyes connected and we meshed into our outstretched welcomes. I think we must have stood in that driveway hugging for at least 30 seconds - a long time for total strangers. But people with Parkinson's can never be "total strangers." You could feel the energy in that hug flowing into a common bond that would last a lifetime. We ate grilled hamburgers, talked about our journey with Parkinson's, and dreamed about our futures. At one point we were all sitting on the sofa in Bren's living room looking at Joan's scrapbook and all that she has accomplished with PD awareness. I stepped back and became a spectator, watching three women who should be out playing tennis, taking long hiking trips, or be running endlessly in wide-open fields catching butterflies. Instead, they sit together on this sofa, in this way-to-early point in their lives trying to determine when their next dose of medicine is due and how they will feel tomorrow because they're overdoing it today. Their paths have crossed for a reason - to do everything possible to promote PD awareness - before their children or their children's children suffer the same fate. Did I say "fate?" I don't believe in predestination, but I do believe in friendships made in heaven . . . and I do believe in predetermined windows of opportunity being offered. I'm so glad that Bren, Peggy, and Joan stepped through this window. And someone, somewhere in time will be glad for it, too." Peggy ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn