Every year, Joan King and her team of Terry Fox Day volunteers manage to make their big September day better, each year with several changes to make the event bigger and more wonderfully successful.
And take it from someone who has organized big and bulky events in the past, it’s not easy. Murphy’s Law lurks, ready to jump into the fray and throw a wrench in the works. So many components, and it takes only one to go off the rails.
As Nancy Quinn once said after a very profitable season at Whirlpool Jetboats many years ago, “Great weather makes the marketing department look smart.” And this 2025 Terry Fox Day was an absolute beauty, weatherwise and otherwise.
The participants came in all ages, in all shapes and sizes and all wanting this to be yet another triumph as millions of people synergize to fight cancer. To “Finish It,” as this year’s marketing campaign implored on posters, T-shirts and everything in between.
I finally arrived at Simcoe Park during the event after finishing my real job, as participants were finishing at their own pace. Music was blaring from the bandshell and local Rotarians were serving up BBQ from under their very festive and professional-looking red event tent. Lotsa familiar faces, all happy to be working hard doing their thing to help “Finish It.”
I ordered my burger from a young man, no doubt the grandson of a local Rotary Club member. He was appropriately garbed, enthusiastic, and knew exactly how to best accomplish his assigned task. My food and drink were ready quickly, the condiments easy to access and the sliced tomatoes were oversized and tasty. Mega yum.
And then the hit of the day arrived, catching me totally off guard. A smiling, youngish senior citizen, wearing a dark blue T-shirt reading Queenston Lewiston Rotary in gold letters. Or was it Lewiston Queenston Rotary? It doesn’t matter, does it? Hands across the border, and all that. Right now, we grab on to any positive multinational possibility, don’t we?
On the back of his blue top, in big letters, it read, “Rotarian at work.” This had been crossed out and changed to “Rotarian having fun.” This about said it all, and the banter began.
I found an available seat at a picnic table, with joyful and triumphant Joy Janzen, her often volunteering husband Steve and their fabulous dog Fitz. At least five members of the ever-involved Hopkins family were with us. Locals helping out, in the truest sense of the phrase.
To think similar scenes were being played out across Canada and around the world. Two years ago, my daughter Carrie was with several thousand Terry Fox supporters in Battersea Park in London (England).
It really is a great Canadian story, year after year, for over forty years now, for all the right reasons. Primarily volunteer-driven, meticulously organized by the professional fundraisers at the Terry Fox Foundation’s national office.
Rambling back now to my new friend wearing his clever “Rotarian having fun” T-shirt. Polite prying by this amateur scribbler from The Lake Report revealed a few facts. His name was Tommy Gerbasi, from Lewiston, who helps out at NOTL Rotary events whenever possible. He is a retired pediatrician, a baby doctor originally from Rochester.
He has had quite the life, and now takes great pleasure in volunteering when he can be helpful. Terry Fox Day is special to him, as he has seen evidence of the good work done internationally, made possible by the funds raised by our very Canadian Terry Fox Foundation.
Dr. Tommy Gerbasi is full of energetic fun, and shared one of his life mantras. “Very few people die wishing they had had less fun.”
Oh, did I mention that our new friend from Lewiston was wearing a very unique custom-made hat? Was that redundant? His headgear was humorous, and I have seen lots of lids around the world. It was a large hot dog, with a large fabric bun holding a mustard-garnished jumbo wiener.
Indeed, a former Lewiston pediatrician volunteering in Niagara-on-the-Lake on our 2025 Terry Fox Day. As he said, “Having way too much fun,” doing what he can to help out in the Terry Fox fight against cancer.
It couldn’t be much better, sitting with a bunch of positive-thinking volunteers at Joan King’s local and annual Terry Fox Day in Simcoe Park.
And with a new American friend, having fun with a hot-dog-themed hat.
Tommy Gerbasi and I agreed that corduroy pillow cases make headlines.
