Visit My Old Sick Friend Mark Reide
Some of you know, and are probably also friends with, my dear old friend, Mark Reider. If so, you may also be aware that Mark is now (and has been for some time) quite ill with Parkinson's Disease and Dementia with Lewey Bodies.
Mark & I have been best of friends since our days together at Belt Jr. High and Wheaton High. Although life has taken us great distances in diverse directions (I now live in Tel Aviv, Israel & Mark is living in an assisted care facility in Potomac, MD), we have both always gone to great lengths to maintain our very close and long friendship.
Now that Mark is in such a difficult medical condition, and his cognitive capacities and general health are unfortunately declining much more rapidly than we would have hoped, I very much want to make a trip to the United States to see him and am actually working on arranging a small get-together for as many of his old friends as I can gather and assemble.
Due to severe financial constraints, and unexpected medical, veterinary, and other expenses, I am unable to cover the costs and expenses that this trip would entail. Because, at this point - not only in Mark's life, but in our lives in general - as we all head into these, our golden years, we never know when, or even if, we'll have another opportunity to do this, I realized that it needs to happen now - or it probably never will. :-(
To that end, I am calling upon your kindness, generosity, and understanding to help out in whatever amount you can so that this important (and perhaps last) reunion of Mark and his old friends can take place while Mark is still hanging in there well enough and strong enough to experience and enjoy it. Hopefully this can be organized and accomplished by the first week of July.
The funds that I am seeking to raise will help me not only with the direct, necessary international and domestic airfares and associated expenses, but also to arrange for and secure reliable, quality care for my five cats (some of whom have medical issues) in my absence.
I am thanking you sincerely in advance from the bottom of my heart for whatever you are able to do to help make this happen. I'm sure you know that Mark and I both will be deeply grateful and appreciative.
"True friendship is like sound health; the value of it is seldom known until it be lost."
--Charles Caleb Colton
"I get by with a little help from my friends"
--John Lennon
"The better part on one's life consists of his friendships"
--Abraham Lincoln
