Time to reflect and also celebrate

Mark Dawson, Editor of Wanganui Chronicle

Wanganui, March 1, 7pm: Four angels are following three nurses and a man roller-skating on his hands ...

On any other day this might be front-page news, but with Relay For Life popular notions of normality go out the window.

It's a time for a little chaos, a bit of clowning around, a smattering of mayhem among the masses who have descended on Cooks Gardens for the 24-hour fundraiser for the Cancer Society.

People take a break from the same-old same-old, dressing up and making their own statements in their own particular way.

Some have fought cancer, some are still fighting it, many are remembering someone they have lost to it. But there is plenty of laughter and chatter amid the sombre reflection which reminds you this is a celebration of life.

A moving moment at 9pm when, in the darkness, a floodlit piper appears on top of the main stand to play a poignant lament. This is followed by the lighting of candles around the track for those who have passed on.

There are also impromptu sing-alongs and a rousing haka, and you meet some interesting people. I met a 16-year-old lad called Paerangi, part of a group from Wanganui City College. He had a nan who had beaten breast cancer; another who had survived it only to succumb to a brain tumour.

We ran a few laps together. He started at noon on Saturday and had done 115 laps when we parted company, his aim to complete 500 by the noon Sunday finish. He was young and fit.

If you're out there, Pae, did you make 500? Let me know, bro.