Fourth.

This past weekend, I was part of something bigger than myself. This past weekend, I participated in an all night event for Children's Miracle Network, the program that works directly with the children's hospital here in Charleston. The tagline was "Standing up for the kids who can't". And we physically did that, we stood all night. We were taught dances (break dancing, swing dancing, etc) and several local bands came to keep the several hundred of us company as we stayed up all night, raising money for CMN. At the conclusion of the weekend and the past week's philanthropy events, it was revealed that we raised almost $75,000 for the children's hospital here in Charleston. Close to $20,000 of that was raised by my sisters and myself. I could not have been prouder to call myself a Phi Mu than I was Saturday night when they told us the total amounts raised. We truly made a difference that night.

The most humbling part of the weekend was when we got to meet some of the kids who are patients at the children's hospital at MUSC. I met and played with children with conditions ranging from simple speech impediments to stage 4 cancers. One little boy about 4 years old played with my group of friends most of the time he was there. He has tumors growing on his face and scalp and back, all of them benign, and had lost his vision in one of his eyes because of it. But despite his condition, he was quite possibly the happiest little boy I have ever met in my life. He didn't care that his face was scarred from surgeries past, he didn't care that he only had vision in one of his eyes, he just enjoyed playing ball, dancing, and singing with us for most of the night. I had the privilege of meeting his parents as well that night. They were the two strongest and most loving people I have ever come in contact with. They had complete faith that their son would grow up healthy and happy and never doubted for a second that he was going to do great things. It made me wish that my faith was as strong as theirs.

I joined the "Be the Match" foundation Saturday night as well. This foundation is the primary resource for which patients can receive bone marrow transplants. If someone needs bone marrow and can't get a match from their family or anyone close to them and my name is pulled up in the registry as a match, I'll be their donor. I'm honestly scared of what it'll be like if I get matched with someone to be their donor, but that fact that I could save someone's life COMPLETELY outweighs that fear. I wasn't involved in community service in high school, and before now, I haven't really done much to give back. So this is my chance. And I'm taking every opportunity I can to make a difference.

So now I'm asking you, whoever out there is reading this, what can you do today, tomorrow, and the next day to make a difference in someone's life? It doesn't have to be anything drastic, you can sign up to volunteer at an animal shelter, or go volunteer at a homeless shelter for a month of two, or just collect canned goods for a food drive in your area. You could even donate blood at a blood drive. All of these things are simple, easy to do, and the absolute high you get from knowing that you've potentially changed someone's life for the better is the best thing you can get out of it.