As I walked into work I saw a table on the other side of the entrance. Erika, one of my co-workers, sat there handing out ice cream to people who dropped dollar bills into a fish bowl. Confused by the situation, I asked one of my managers what the donations were for.

“She's asking for donations for the Susan G. Komen walk for the cure. It goes towards breast cancer research.”

After hearing what it was, I pretty much brushed it off and went to work. After being there for a little over an hour, they decided to give Erika, with her feet swollen and belly ready to pop, a break. And of course they asked me to take over.

“ Sherri! I don’t know how to fundraise!”

Is all I kept saying over and over as my manager walked me to the table. I stood there extremely nervous, afraid to ask people to donate, scarred that they’ll think it’s dumb. Even the thought of a simple “no” scarred me. Then a lady approached my table. I told here what we were raising money for, and she actually donated! I felt so proud, and began to speak out.

“Hello, would you like to donate to breast cancer!”

Is what filled the entrance over and over like a broken record player, or a parrot that learned his first word. Pretty soon I was running through the store grabbing more boxes of cones and buckets of ice cream, trying to keep up with my donations.

My third day of fundraising I ran into a bad apple! In asked a lady if she wanted to donate and she told my manager I was harassing and soliciting her. My pride was hurt and I was so confused, how could someone become so upset about a question?

I was pretty angry and then a lady named Linda walked over. Mrs. Linda told me how her mother had died when Linda was a child from breast cancer. She looked at the jar and the high stack of donation cards that had already been signed. It brought tears of happiness to her face. She thanked me so politely and placed $20.00 dollars in the jar!

At that moment I felt so proud of what I was doing and realized how much fun I was having doing it. I realized there was no time to be shy when it is for a good cause.

Within the next two weeks I heard dozens of stories of breast cancer victims and also many survivor stories. I met some survivors and chatted with them about the disease and their recoveries. I also met a lot of new people and shared great laughs and smiles.

Raising money for Susan G. Komen was so much fun. It felt good to help and great being out their just being myself, exposing a new side of me that had been covered in shadows