Cape women fight breast cancer by walking in Susan G. Komen Three-Day
Friends since their days in the old Lewes Elementary School, Ann Collins Hurley, Charlotte Hukill Passwaters and Cyndi Walls Martin are no strangers to physical challenges. They played hockey for Ruth Skoglund’s first hockey team at Rehoboth Junior High and later for Carolyn Ivins at the original Cape High School. After graduation in 1975, all remained physically active.
When Passwaters underwent a mastectomy for breast cancer at age 38, and with five children ranging from 2 to 15 years old, she treated her disease with quiet dignity, which was her norm. However, on the 20th anniversary of her diagnosis, she wanted to commemorate the accomplishment of being a cancer-free breast cancer survivor with something big. Approaching her fellow “posse” members Hurley and Martin with the idea of training for and walking in the Susan G. Komen Three-Day for Breast Cancer in October 2015, Passwaters was met with a resounding “Yes!” by Hurley who had the Three-Day on her bucket list. Martin, however, was less than enthusiastic.
“At first,” said Martin, “I thought, 'Are you nuts?' I mean, seriously, we aren’t 18 anymore! But when you look in the eyes of one of your dearest friends and see her determination and hope, how can you say no? So, I succumbed to peer pressure and signed on. I guess nothing has changed since high school!”
The three began training in earnest as a group in January 2015, walking the streets and farms of Bridgeville, where Passwaters lives, and then building up to the entire loop of the Gordons Pond and Junction & Breakwater trails in Lewes and Rehoboth for 18 to 20 miles a day each weekend. First in winter’s snow and sleet, then spring’s rain, then summer’s heat and finally the pleasant September days, they trained every weekend, logging over 500 miles on their journey. This training served them well as the Komen walk was spent the weekend of Oct. 2, 3 and 4.
Dressed in camo rain pants and pink bandanas, they wrapped their sneakers in pink duct tape to keep out the rain. The women, part of 1,000 other walkers, braved the wind and driving rain of Friday’s nor’easter and the threat of Hurricane Joaquin. Walking 22 miles from opening ceremonies at Willow Grove Mall north of Philadelphia, through the streets of Abington, up Chestnut Hill, downtown Mount Airy, the puddle-soaked paths of Fairmont Park and the Schuylkill River, and finally through the Philly Art museum, they finished, cold, tired and wet back at the Convention Center Friday night. And as if this weren’t enough, they got up on Saturday morning at the crack of dawn and did a different path for 24 miles through the streets and suburbs of west Philly and Sunday, 15 miles through South Philly, ending at the Navy Yard for closing ceremonies, logging in over 60 miles.
Passwaters said, “The people of the City of Brotherly Love sure showed how wonderful they are! From the tremendous support showed us by the multiple cheering sections offering words of encouragement, to the little kids who offered total strangers high fives, snacks and drinks, to the police officers in pink shirts who directed traffic, to the men and women in pink shirts, and some in tears, who thanked us for walking, it was all very overwhelming.”
The Posse in Pink, as they called their team, raised almost $15,000 out of a total $2.7 million from the entire three-day event for breast cancer research and community support.
