For hope, for tears, for life

The Shine for Shani Football Marathon, on Sunday 29 July 2018, was an incredible day.

A day where hundreds of family, friends and supporters had fun, played loads of football in the rain, ate lots of delicious home made cakes (and some pizza) and created the most wonderful feeling of inspiration and community.

All in Shani's memory and all with a view to making life better for kids with magic hearts like Shani's.

Thanks to all of that support and some amazingly generous and wonderful people, we raised over £10,000 that day for research into improving the success rates of kids' heart transplants!

That changes and saves lives and has the power to make the world a better place.

It was a day that felt really positive amongst the pain of the past year and a half.

Where it felt like we were all accomplishing something special together.

Where we were all smiling for Shani.

There is Jewish prayer in the Shema that I used to say for Shani in the hope that it would make a difference:
With all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.

A prayer that Shani would eventually have a whole and healthy heart, that she would live a full life and that she would do so with strength and with courage and with determination.

Obviously that didn't happen, and for a while I found it impossible to say the prayer at all without being overwhelmed by tears.

At times I was enraged at the Divine

Destroyer of Worlds
Render of Souls
Bringer of Night
Crusher of Hope

Now however, with the inspiration of friends I am starting to feel that it is a prayer that perfectly sums up what it is that Shine For Shani is trying to achieve for other children with difficult heart conditions: a healthy heart and a life of vitality and strength.

For hope
For tears
For life

Over the summer I had the pleasure of swimming in the sea in Cornwall and Hove.

On the surface there is life and colour and noise and action. 

Splashing and playing and laughing.

But when you swim underwater in open water it can be frightening. 

It is a place of worry and anxiety. 

Dark, cold and silent.

A place where sometimes you are not even sure if you can make it back again. 

It just feels too hard too far too much.

But you do.

And for a while you enjoy the surface world and its life and colour and noise and action. 

You enjoy living and working and the company of good people.

And the cycle continues.

Life and tears.

Up and down.

Above and below the water.

Living and grieving.

Not always easy but certainly possible and made so much easier by being able to focus on the good in the world.

In spite of all of her tears, Anne Frank somehow was able to say

Think of all the beauty still left around you and be happy

Shana Tova U'MTukah

A very happy and sweet New Year