An Unexpected Call to Help

Hello Everyone - I hope you're all having a great summer!

I'll get right to the point on this one...

Everyday, I work with a fantastic guy named Dave... and he happens to be the loving father of 3 beautiful girls - 2 of which desperately need our support. Kate and Olivia, along with the approximately 500 others in the US share a rare genetic disorder called Ataxia-telangiectasia (better known as A-T).

Kate & Olivia Video

Imagine a disease that combines the worst symptoms of muscular dystrophy, cerebral palsy, cystic fibrosis, immune deficiencies, and cancer. Children with A-T are usually confined to wheelchairs by age 10 and often do not survive their teens. Because A-T is a multi-system disease, scientists believe that A-T research will help more prevalent diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, AIDS, and even Cancer. Currently, there is no cure for A-T, however, researchers are making progress -- but it's very costly.

This is where you and I come in.
In order to fund these ground-breaking research projects, the A-T Children's Project holds various charity events. One of the largest and most important is the Walt Disney World Marathon. Runners can sign up through the organization to run in the event as a way to raise money for A-T. This is a great cause on its own, however, after meeting Kate and Olivia, there was no question that I had to do my part to help. I'm proud to say that my wife, Melissa, and I are running a half-marathon in Walt Disney World on January 13, 2008! (Which also happens to be my birthday!) Now, we don't claim to be runners, in fact, we're fairly inexperienced... but 13.1 miles is the goal, and we've already been training for a month! This may be the most unexpected, impulsive thing I've ever done... but I feel like it was a calling. I've been wanting to do something together with my wife, I've been wanting to get more active, I've been wanting to help the Veldink family through this, the run is on my birthday of all days, the travel plans we found were ridiculously good -- I couldn't find an excuse not to do this!

We joined as part of the Free Beer and Hot Wings Morning Show Team lead by one of the co-hosts, Eric Zane. Our team goal is to raise $100,000 in donations - ALL of which goes directly towards developing life-improving treatments, and hopefully a cure for A-T! Melissa and I each set personal donation goals of $1,500 as our contribution to the team total... but we need your help to get there. Melissa and I each have a fund-raising website where you can electronically contribute, check our progress, and leave us messages.


If you wish to sponsor us, please follow these simple steps:

1) Go to our team web page by following this link:

A-T Marathon Team Page
(Or go to www.freebeerandhotwings.com, and click the A-T Children's Project banner)

2) Once on the team page, scroll down to the team roster

3) Click on either Jason DeBoer or Melissa DeBoer, and it will bring you to our individual pages.

4) On the right side of the page (above our picture), click the link that says 'DONATE NOW'


That's all there is to it! We want to blow this goal away, and with everyone helping even a little, we can make a huge difference! If you have any questions on the donation process, or if you would like to contribute in a manner other than the website, please feel free to contact me at www.myspace.com/jase_deboer, and I'll be more than happy to help.


Thank you so much for your support - Let's find a cure for Kate, Olivia, and others who suffer from A-T!

Cheers,
- Jason (& Melissa) DeBoer

Change

Before I moved to Lowell and started attending Ada Bible Church, I lived out by Grand Valley State University, and would often attend a similar church called Mars Hill in Grandville, MI. The pastor at Mars Hill is Rob Bell, and he's an incredibly gifted speaker - especially when it comes to taking wordy or complex, deep content from the Bible, and breaking it down in a way that's easy to comprehend both the central themes, but also how they relate to you personally. Coincidentally, in a small group session at Ada Bible, I was introduced to a modern Bible study that uses short videos to communicate content for the group discussion... and the videos feature none other than Rob Bell. The videos are called NOOMAs, and I highly recommend that you check them out. You can find portions of them on the NOOMA Myspace page. Rob's latest installment is titled 'TODAY", and it talks about how much energy we spend living in the 'good 'ol days'. He talks of how yesterday is in the past, and tomorrow is uncertain - all we have is today... and if so much of our energy is spent dwelling on how things used to be, our arms aren't free to fully embrace the day that God has given us right here and now.

After watching the premiere of 'TODAY' - as with all of the episodes - I began to think about what I just saw, and how it pertains to me. In a way, I've embraced today, but in many ways... I haven't. Though I am extremely happily married, sometimes I find myself wishing I was able to come and go like I used to. In college, my friends and I would stay up all night, go to the bar when we wanted, and really only had to worry about ourselves. There were a couple years there where I laughed at the idea of going to church on Sunday. Anyway, I find myself thinking how much fun we had in college... those were the good ol' days. But really, if those were the best years of my life, then what do I have to look forward to right now and the days ahead?

Rather than rest on my laurels, rather than always looking in the rear-view mirror... maybe it's time to keep my eyes on the road ahead. I think about the time I had with my grandparents when I was younger - and they are such special memories of mine. Now that Grandpa has moved on... now that change has come around... I'm finding that the time I spend with my Grandma every Friday at lunch is more special than I could have imagined. I'm actually creating better days today than I had in the past... and I'm realizing now that I can do that in any situation. It's actually quite exciting.

I just celebrated my 2-year anniversary with Melissa, and rather than look back at the great times we had when we first met, I'm looking forward to today, and the many days that God has in store for us. Things change, and we have to deal with it. Things will never be the way they used to be. It's nice to have the memories, but it's a new day, and it's time to create new memories. I like the way John Mayer put it... "I'd like to think the best of me is still hiding up my sleeve."

Welcome!

Hello Everyone!

For those of you who I have yet to meet - my name is Jase, and whether you're a long-time friend, a family member, or a random web surfer who stumbled upon this page - I'm glad you found your way here. After quite a bit of taunting from friends, I finally joined Myspace a few months back. To my surprise, the feature that most Myspacers seem to ignore wound up being one of my favorites. Of course, I'm talking abot the blog feature.

After my profile was up and running with the best of them, I began posting random thoughts and opinions in my blog on Myspace. Lately, alot of my conversations take place between friends at a bar, or between cubicles in the office... and I always enjoy the discussion, but there is alot more going on in my head than most people here (which I'm sure holds true for almost anyone). So, my random thoughts that often go unspoken began finding their way into my entires online - and at first I thought I was doing it for my own reference... but I became more and more aware as time went on that many friends, family members, and myspace nomads were keeping tabs on my blog. (I'm glad I never wrote anything offensive...)

Anyway, since I've found this new interest, and others seem to be enjoying it as well (I'm going out on a limb there...), I had this crazy idea to start posting on a site that allows me to better manage my entries, and possibly be read by more people. Now, the main purpose of this is still for myself, but I would be lying if I said I don't enjoy sharing the things that are bouncing around in my mind; the things that make me tick. Due to the way I think, I'm sure topics will range from business to music, sports to movies, and family to friends, and more. I can't promise it will always be enthralling content, or that you'll even agree with my perspective on some things - feel free to leave comments... but if your goal is to be offensive with your comments, you can also feel free to forget this site exists.

So, I'll try to update this regularly, and if for some reason you find the inner workings of my mind so interesting that you want email notification when a new posting goes up, there just so happens to be a feature that automatically sends out a message when I submit an entry. Just send me your email address if you're so inclined. Otherwise, you can always check the blog by following this URL: http://www.jasethoughts.blospot.com/. That's it, here goes nothing...

Welcome to jase-space!

Cheers,
Jase

**PS - for those of you who watch The Office... yes, 'jasethoughts' is a play off 'creedthoughts' - only my blog isn't a Word document, and I don't think I'm quite as crazy. We'll see :)