Making my mark

I had to do a rather important thing today. Stand up on stage at the Mary MacKillop canonisation celebrations in Penola and introduce and interview an interesting woman who has chronicled our first Saint's life for a movie.

And it got me thinking.

Mary MacKillop obviously has made a super huge mark on not only Australia, but the world.

But if I died tomorrow - what mark would I have left on the world. Hmmm, now that's a scary thought.

I have often thought that one of my aims in life, now that I am a mummy, is to do things which will make my precious A proud.

It's not my driving force in life, but it's something I'm conscious of. I hope that when she is older, she will look back and see that not only did I strive to do the best I could for her, often under trying circumstances, but also that I tried to 'do good' in general.

I guess the thing of which I am the proudest, which can be measured, is the 'Every Drop Counts' campaign, which led to the reinstatement of a visiting blood collection service in Mt Gambier.

The campaign, the largest of its kind ever run in the region, was a resounding success, attracting 15,000 signatures in less than two months on a petition calling for the service's reinstatement.

I am super proud of that achievement, which was done after my younger sister's leukaemia diagnosis. It was done during an extremely passionate period during my life. A time when I would have done anything to make B better, to find a matching donor for her, and I honestly hoped that someone else could also be helped.

So I guess with that in mind I have made a mark on Mt Gambier, hardly the world.

Not too shabby an effort though. Obviously not in the league of Mary, but I guess it's all relative.

And I guess it's a decent effort to be invited to stand on stage in front of thousands of people and speak about Australia's first saint.

With that in mind, I'm sure A will be proud of me for a whole range of reasons.

Mwah, Ellie xxx