Dave McCue Marathon
Hi, thanks for visiting this site. I'm participating in the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society's Team In Training (TNT) Honolulu Marathon fundraiser in honor of my friend Dave McCue, pictured here. Dave died of leukemia on July 12th, 2003 after a two year battle with lymphoma. He was only 35 years old. He left behind his wife Susan, his two-year-old daughter Zoe, and many grieving friends and relatives.
I worked with Dave at a software company -- formerly Epicentric, now Vignette -- for almost three years. Although our friendship only rarely left the workplace, I still consider Dave a close friend. He was crazy, quirky, fun-loving, intelligent, creative, generous, hilarious, and above-all unique. Ironically it was Dave's struggle with lymphoma, which started shortly after I arrived at Epicentric in late 2000, that brought us closer together and made us friends.
Like too many of us, I have lost several close friends and relatives to cancer in my life, the most recent before Dave being my mother-in-law in 1998. That experience led me and my wife Jane to sign up for the TNT Honolulu Marathon fundraiser in 1999. To help us with that event, I built a website, which evolved into a company that I started with some friends called PledgePage. PledgePage was dedicated to helping people raise money for good causes. We didn't have any financial success (which is why I had to go ask Epicentric for a job), but the online fundraising system itself was successful. To keep it alive we donated it to a non-profit organization called CharityFocus, who continue to maintain and enhance the technology. To date PledgePage has helped people create over 2000 fundraising websites and raise approximately $2 million for various charities. A large share of that money has gone to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. I shared these experiences with Dave when he was going through his treatments, which created an understanding -- a bond -- between us.
So here I am again, after four years, preparing to run the Honolulu Marathon again and again asking for your fundraising support. Please visit my donation page and help me meet my fundraising goal of $5000. The money raised by this event will go directly to research institutions like UCSF who are making real progress in the fight against cancer. I believe that we can work together to prevent blood-related cancer deaths like Dave's in our lifetime. Thank you so much for your support.
And don't forget to sign my guestbook before you leave.
Thanks,
John Petersen
9/30/03
_______
Dave kept the following Teddy Roosevelt quotation framed on his desk at work:
It is not the critic who counts, nor the man who points out where the strong man stumbled, or where a doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man in the arena whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs, and who comes up short again and again, who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause. The man who at best knows the triumph of high achievement and who at worst, if he fails, fails while daring greatly, so that his place will never be with those cold timid souls who never knew victory or defeat.
Honolulu Marathon, December 14th, 2003
I worked with Dave at a software company -- formerly Epicentric, now Vignette -- for almost three years. Although our friendship only rarely left the workplace, I still consider Dave a close friend. He was crazy, quirky, fun-loving, intelligent, creative, generous, hilarious, and above-all unique. Ironically it was Dave's struggle with lymphoma, which started shortly after I arrived at Epicentric in late 2000, that brought us closer together and made us friends.
Like too many of us, I have lost several close friends and relatives to cancer in my life, the most recent before Dave being my mother-in-law in 1998. That experience led me and my wife Jane to sign up for the TNT Honolulu Marathon fundraiser in 1999. To help us with that event, I built a website, which evolved into a company that I started with some friends called PledgePage. PledgePage was dedicated to helping people raise money for good causes. We didn't have any financial success (which is why I had to go ask Epicentric for a job), but the online fundraising system itself was successful. To keep it alive we donated it to a non-profit organization called CharityFocus, who continue to maintain and enhance the technology. To date PledgePage has helped people create over 2000 fundraising websites and raise approximately $2 million for various charities. A large share of that money has gone to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. I shared these experiences with Dave when he was going through his treatments, which created an understanding -- a bond -- between us.
So here I am again, after four years, preparing to run the Honolulu Marathon again and again asking for your fundraising support. Please visit my donation page and help me meet my fundraising goal of $5000. The money raised by this event will go directly to research institutions like UCSF who are making real progress in the fight against cancer. I believe that we can work together to prevent blood-related cancer deaths like Dave's in our lifetime. Thank you so much for your support.
And don't forget to sign my guestbook before you leave.
Thanks,
John Petersen
9/30/03
_______
Dave kept the following Teddy Roosevelt quotation framed on his desk at work:
It is not the critic who counts, nor the man who points out where the strong man stumbled, or where a doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man in the arena whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs, and who comes up short again and again, who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause. The man who at best knows the triumph of high achievement and who at worst, if he fails, fails while daring greatly, so that his place will never be with those cold timid souls who never knew victory or defeat.
Honolulu Marathon, December 14th, 2003