Patterson Relay For Life Hits Decade Mark
When Relay For Life is held in Patterson this week, it’ll be exactly a decade since the event took place for the first time. And each year since 2009, the event has steadily grown, with loftier goals and larger crowds.
Relay will take place this Saturday, June 9 at the Patterson Fire Department, beginning at 8 a.m. and lasting until midnight. Two local community members, along with hundreds of others, are ready for another Relay that inspires and brings community together.
Resident Rachael Paradise said she began with Relay in 2011 because a good friend of hers lost her sister to brain cancer and her friend asked her to come to the event with her. The first year she went, Paradise had no idea what to expect; she only knew it was a fundraiser to fight cancer. The next year, Paradise was deeply involved and on the planning committee.
Paradise said there were moments she didn’t expect that touched her, like the luminary and the survivor’s lap.
“It was a beautiful thing,” she said. “Just the feeling of unity that we’re all fighting for the same cause. We all just want to end this horrible disease.”
When Paradise first started on the committee in 2012, Relay of Patterson raised $75,000, but in 2016, Relay had raised $125,000. The longer the event has gone on, the more familiar residents in the community have become with what Relay offers, Paradise said.
Paradise said any community that has Relay helps residents that have suffered from cancer personally, taken care of a cancer-stricken person, or lost a loved one to the insidious disease.
“It helps them see the bigger picture, there are people that are in same boat as them, people that will stand behind them, fighting for them and fighting with them,” Paradise said. “As a community it brings us closer together, brings us all into the same place. We’re all very different, but at Relay everyone is fighting for the same thing and that’s to end cancer.”
Resident Lorraine Calebrese said cancer affected her family when her sister was diagnosed with breast cancer more than two decades ago. She originally joined the Mahopac Relay For Life, but then went to the Patterson Relay when it first got underway ten years ago since it was closer to her house.
Calebrese said when Relay first began it was extremely small, but steadily grew since then. The past couple years it was thought the event might even outgrow the Patterson Fire House, until a Brewster Relay For Life was started last year to take on more people interested in raising money for a cure.
She said she was going through old Relay photos from past years to put on a big poster board to show teams that may have just started last year or this year.
Calebrese said Relay is able to bring so many people together, stressing cancer- -in one way or another–affects every person at some point in their life. Relay For Life is a great day to spend with family and friends and the luminary ceremony is the most touching part of the all-day event.
“It’s just grown every year and our goals are bigger, we have more teams, more sponsors,” she said.
