It didn’t seem right to let today go by without celebrating the life of Adrian Sudbury.

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Adrian (aka Baldy) was a beautiful boy from England who worked tirelessly until the last few days of his life to educate people about the awareness of being a bone marrow donor. If you don’t believe me, do a google search and you’ll find hundreds of stories about him. You can also read some previous posts I wrote about him. He was an amazing man, a fantastic journalist and inspired so many people, many of whom he never even personally met. Me, being one of them.

Without a doubt he made a huge impact on my life in the brief times that we emailed back and forth about ideas for his campaign. He was obviously a very unselfish and loving person. I think everyone who read his blog fell at least a little bit in love with him. There aren’t many words to describe someone like Adrian. He was completely and utterly full of awesome-ness. Is that even a word?

There is no doubt that he has saved/will continue to save thousands of people because of his Sign up for Sudders campaign, which made it all the way around the world and directly to the head of his government – the Prime Minster of the U.K., Gordon Brown.

Although Adrian isn’t here now to directly work on the campaign his efforts continue to save the lives of others because he gave a gift that keeps on giving. If you convince even 1 person to sign up for bone marrow donation and then they convince another person the circle continues and grows larger. This is what Adrian did but on a much larger, worldwide scale. Now solely because of Adrian the U.K. has a secondary school program where every student is taught about bone marrow donation and why it is so important. Imagine all the students who are now educated about donation because of his campaign. Whether on purpose or inadvertently they can now pass that information onto many other people.

With all the ways to share information – blogs, tweeting and facebooking – this circle will keep growing and so many more lives will be saved. It’s amazing!

This is all because of Adrian, literally. This was his brain child and he kept going with it, kept pushing until the very end. He did a lot of his work on the campaign in just the couple months right before his passing. When he left us to start his new journey he left enough knowledge & passion with the people around him to keep his campaign going strong. Because of his determination to help save the lives of other people suffering with the same disease, his dream has become a reality. If you ever think that you can’t make a difference, sit back and think about Adrian.

That is the power of what one person can do.

He started the beginning of a beautiful circle that spanned the globe and will hopefully continue for the remainder of time or until we can put a stop to Leukemia.

Did you know that if you donate bone marrow it can be used to save the life of someone else halfway across the world? If you are a patient you can receive bone marrow from anywhere in the world as well. Thanks to Adrian there are now thousands more people donating and helping to save the lives of Leukemia patients everywhere.

Someday that person could be you, your child, your parent, your friend. The donor could very well be someone who was inspired directly though the school program or from following Adrian’s blog. Perhaps it could be someone who donated indirectly because someone else they knew stumbled upon his story and told them about it. Maybe you’ll tell your co-worker during lunch about this story you’re reading right now, maybe they’ll tell their friends later tonight during happy hour. Maybe one of those people will sign up to be a donor and become a match for someone in need. This is the beauty of the campaign that Adrian started.

One main reason many people don’t donate is because they think it is still a painful surgery with large needles being jabbed into your bones. Nowadays in most instances, it’s not too different from giving blood. You can sit in your street clothes and listen to your Ipod. Most people don’t realize how far bone marrow donation has come and how much less invasive it is. Thanks to Adrian getting the word out about how much easier donation has become and I am sure we will continue to see many more people saving lives and signing up to donate.

Maybe right now that person is you.

For more information visit:

Marrow.org – in the U.S.

Anthony Nolan Trust – in the U.K.

Bone Marrow Donors Worldwide – Everywhere

If you aren’t eligible to donate blood marrow there are other ways you can help:

1. You can sign up to become a school speaker.
2. You can help out a local bone marrow drive.
3. You can tweet about Adrian and what he accomplished.
4. You can give a financial donation to any of the bone marrow registries or to the Sudder’s Campaign.
5. You can buy Baldy’s Book and learn more about him while donating to the cause.
6. You can re-post this article anywhere you want so more people can read about Adrian & bone marrow donation.
7. You can post one of the widgets I made for his campaign to your blog, your website or social networking page so that   other friends/readers may see it, click on it and learn more about getting involved in the Sudder’s Campaign.
8. You can join the Adrian’s Army Facebook group
9. You can work on a grassroots project contacting local legistlators.
10. You can read Baldy’s Blog and forward it to one friend, or 10!
11. You can tell just one person what you learned today about bone marrow donation and how easy it is to save a life.

If you can’t do any of the above, you can raise a glass and say a toast to Adrian Sudbury, his family and the gift he gave to the world. Thank you Adrian!

Love, Beth

Dear World,

When I made beers and beans i wanted a way to reach out to other people. I have a strong desire to help others and the volunteering aspects of travel have always amazed me. I wanted this site to be about helping those less fortunate and about people thinking about how the things they do affect others. I wanted people to travel on ground level and try to see things from others perspectives. Everywhere around the world everyone wants the same basic things. It really doesn’t matter if you’re living in a yurt in Mongolia or a high rise in New York we all want to love and be loved, be respected and for our children to have bright futures. So many times people think they are so drastically different because of their skin color, cultural differences or where they are from. In the end we are all same.

I am asking you to read this blog and learn how similar we all are. Adrian is an amazing person with quite a warm & beautiful soul. Please read his blog and learn about his life and how it changed so quickly.

He is on a mission.

He wants people to donate bone marrow so that others like him might have a shot at becoming healthy again. As his blog states, he is at the beginning of the`end so be sure to stop by and say hello to him before it is too late. Watch the videos of bone marrow donation that he has on his site. You will quickly see that it’s not the horrible, bone breaking surgery that it used to be. Now with modern day science it’s just like giving blood, something you can do in your street clothes sitting in a chair. Personally, I didn’t know that and I was really excited to learn how easy the process has become, I would have never known if he hadn’t posted it on his site. He’s been very busy lately, meeting with the Prime Minister of the U.K. and getting his word out. I want to try to help him which is why I’m posting it here and also why I joined the bone marrow registry yesterday. In the end we are all the same. Please consider donating bone marrow and saving the lives of others.

Thank you, Beth

p.s. Feel free to post this on your site or anywhere else where you think it might make a difference.

If you feel donation is not for you or you cannot donate marrow there are other ways to become involved. Team in Traning (TNT) is a group that raises money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. It is really, really awesome. They will train you for a marathon, 1/2 marathon, bike race or triathalon. Plus you visit great locations all over the world for your race – Dublin, Hawaii, etc. I ran a marathon in Honolulu with TNT 2 years ago and it was by far the BEST thing I have ever done. I made great friends and raising the money was not as hard as I thought it would be, def. not as hard as running 26.2 miles. Please consider joining, all ages and exercise levels are accepted. I’m only 5′ and can’t run to save my life but somehow it was easier when I knew I was running for other people. Time wise, everyone in the 70 yr old age range beat me to the finish so believe me, you can do this no matter how old you are or what shape you are in.