Life changes fast. Life changes in the instant. You sit down to dinner and life as you know it ends.

I'm sure a few of you are familiar with Joan's words. I've read them a couple of times before, but when my Dad sat us down this past fall to tell us he had cancer, they took on a whole new meaning.

Like most, my siblings and I were familiar with this conversation—it's one we had with my Mom over a decade ago and with countless relatives and friends since then—but one that is always deeply painful.

In the months after, I watched as my Dad began a rigorous chemo regimen that pulled the life out of him. I watched as a man who was genuinely invincible in my eyes grappled with uncertainty, fear, and unimaginable pain.

But this isn't a story of loss.

This is a story of hope.

This is a story of a combination of chemo and immunotherapy actually working.

This is a story of a man who could hardly walk more than a mile six months ago now back on a bike riding alongside us (let's be honest, way ahead of us).

I don't know what the future holds, but what I do know is that both of my parents are still here because of the tireless work institutions like Dana Farber and Sloan Kettering do day in and day out. They are both still here because people like you believe in the idea that we can have an impact on something bigger than ourselves.

In a few days, we'll be riding over 200 miles in the Pan-Mass Challenge to raise money for cancer research and treatment. As most of you know by now, we ride in memory of Davey Hovey, but as you can imagine, I'll have another person on my mind this year—someone who has been through more than I will ever know or understand yet still shows up every day with so much hope, someone who continues to quietly and humbly persevere, someone I love more than anything.

So let me leave you with this:

Life changes fast.

Life changes in an instant.

So you can either sit back and watch it happen or show up and get the fuck after it.

We're choosing the latter.

With love,

Carson