A Fundraising Milestone

This week, I have crossed my first fundraising milestone for my 2009 Team in Training Campaign. I have raised over $3,600, which is the minimum amount necessary to compete in my event. Counting a few checks that I have just received, I am at about $3,696.

When I do a marathon, I always have a number of goals. For example, last year my goal was to finish in 5:55:55 or less, in honor of five years in remission from cancer. That was my “A” goal. But I had a “B” goal – to set a PR (personal record), which would have been to do better than about a 6:14. Now if I got out there and things were not going my way at all, I also had a “C” goal – to finish the race, whether I walked, ran, or crawled across the line (or was dragged over the finish line by someone else, shot out of a cannon, etc.).

It is the same way with my fundraising goal, a marathon of sorts by itself. My “C” goal is to raise the minimum amount required by LLS to participate in the Country Music Marathon. That is the absolute bottom line, what I must achieve, and it feels good to be past that milestone with four months of fundraising still ahead.

I don’t know if I can attain my “A” goal of $14,645 this year. The economy is pretty awful and bad news triggers panic even among folks who are doing OK. People have been generous – there is no way to even reach my minimum goal without a lot of generous people - but it has been tougher than usual. In order to hit my “A” goal, I am going to have to leave my comfort zone for fundraising and try some new things. What things? I have no idea right now, but I am thinking about it a lot.

Now if I only had a Senate Seat that I could fill ….