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Malichi Camenzind plays ring toss with the flamingos while Relay for Life teams walk around the track at Havre High School Friday. Lexi Eierdam, Travis Kohler and Melanie Sohm used flamingos to raise money. Someone paid to have the flamingos placed on a person's yard with a sign saying "you've been flocked," then the yard owner paid to have the flamingos moved to someone else's yard. The group raised more than $1,100 "flocking," Melanie Sohm said, adding that it was such a hit - more than 60 yards had been flocked since April 11 - they may do purple flamingos next year. She said the group got the idea from a fundraising group in Oregon. The Relay for Life also had a frozen T-shirt contest with prizes for adults and childrens who were able to get a shirt on first.
The Survivors Walk at the annual American Cancer Society's Relay for Life is always one of the most solemn and inspiring events of the night.
Purple T-shirt-clad survivors walk around the track at Havre High School as inspirational music is played and the names are read off as they walk. It was that way Friday night. Some people walked briskly, others slowly. One was in a wheelchair.
"This track is longer than it was last year," one woman said, laughing.
But one participant had no trouble going around the track. Way ahead of the others, running and jumping up and down as he rounded the course was 7-year-old Konnor Johnson of Meridian, Idaho. He was in Havre visiting his grandparents, Dale and Julie Haggen.
This is the seventh Relay for Life in which he has participated.
At 4 months, he was discovered to have neuroblastoma.
Since then, he has undergone three operations and four rounds of chemotherapy.
He was 1 year old when his father pushed him in a baby stroller for his first Relay. Today, Konnor is in his third year of remission. He still has one more operation to undergo, a spine surgery, but that can't happen until he is 16 and his spine has stopped growing, his grandmother said.
Konnor was a speaker at the ceremonies that took place just before the Survivors Walk.
"I want to thank everyone who donated to my benefit," Konnor said. "Thank you all."
After the walk, the survivors gathered for a butterfly release.
Relay co-chair Kyndra Hall explained that an old Indian tradition is that if you have a wish, you should tell a butterfly because the butterfly can't tell anyone about it, but the butterfly can then fly into the heavens and make sure the wish is transmitted to God.
As the ceremony ended, people exchanged stories of their battles with cancer.
Event co-chair Reba Domire said her grandmother endured cancer for many years, and her husband's father died of cancer.
"Then I have a good friend who got cancer," she said. "Cancer is not a favorite thing around here," she said.
Lynette Chu said she recalls being devastated when she learned in 2010 that she had thyroid cancer.
She underwent surgery and the problem was solved, but two years later, she got skin cancer.
Others told stories of how they fought for years to beat cancer, and how their families have been devastated by cancer.
Another walked up to a reporter, pointed toward his notebook and said "tell people to get their pap smears."
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