ANNA MONICA

Relay for Life held locally It wasn’t my plan to write about the Relay for Life this week because, frankly, I feel like I was up for more than 24 hours. And wow! I was, but not alone. More than 1,200 people were sharing time with me and we know that time and the weeks before were well spent because we raised, so far, at least $111,000. Stell Furniture and L’Observateur sponsored our “Tammy’s Teams” and there are so many people who deserve credit for their efforts in the fight against cancer; so many who have not had a personal struggle with it, but reach out with understanding and a fierce effort to help their friends and neighbors who have. Since I write this column, though, I can talk about our team. The all-nighter last Saturday, provided a chance for everyone to join in a whole lot of activity and plenty of fun! Our group of Tammy’s Tennis Teams I and II had a blast! We didn’t win any prizes, although we tried our hardest. Dani Shackelford led the way in the scavenger hunt. We couldn’t figure out how we got beat! Then, you should have seen our ladies in the team hula hoop contest. We didn’t win that either, but it was close – and very comical! Our day had started much earlier that morning with a few of us loading up Annie Stell’s truck and then getting our campsite ready at Joe Keller Stadium It was an absolute riot! None of us had any idea how to start, but Annie, an experienced camper, led us in putting together the strange little pieces until we had success. We still had a comedy of errors though, because we had to fight a strong wind and at one point, Meg Spatz, former gymnast, spread herself out on the tarp to hold it down. Then, I made a frantic call to fire department chief Bobby Bourgeois who helped us finish. His wife, Marlene, a good friend of my sister, Cookie, is also a cancer survivor and we finally met that evening. I must say that one great advantage to living in an area like ours is that probably nowhere else would a call like mine produce the results it did. Ours was a tennis theme and Michael Montz came out to show wife Pam how to draw the lines for our “tennis court.” Martha Leach, Dani, Cheryl Analla, Carol Madere Vicknair and I completed our “construction crew.” After Bridget Montz and Meg finished decorating with tennis racquets and balls, the results were tiring but pleasing to us. We sure added fun to the evening because a lot of the kids ended up throwing tennis balls. Our group sold sweets, water and had Maria Guidry face-painting for hours (at a very cheap rate because we wanted to make the kids happy) before she was finally relieved by Derek Scontrino who was also popular. Nolan Vicknair accompanied wife, Carol to the event and teammates included co-captains Cindy Gillies and Jo Ann Falterman, Cheri Montz, Cathy Munoz, Janice Ducote, Wilma Geraci, Becky Vance, Debbie Jeffcoat, Sheryl Schoen and Kim and Jason Pinholster. An accomplished chef, Kim made all the sweet stuff we sold. We surely were an entertaining group with very few people having more fun than us. Our matching shirts were donated by Joey Scontrino, a team member, and we had black tennis skirts or shorts and thought we looked really good. We just about out danced, hula hooped, kick boxed and cut up as much or more than any group there. We had the spirit!! A team of my cousins, the Oubres, led by cancer survivor and sisters Clair Zerringue and Anna Weber, did win prizes. Cancer survivors who captained teams for the Relay got recognition for that. Plus, I believe we were also working for ourselves and the future we hope to have. Team husbands Michael Schoen (who says he wore out), Joey and Jason were on the volleyball team that came close to winning and while some played, the rest were cheerleaders. Because of our attire, we had to convince people we were actually tennis players and not real-life cheerleaders. Other team member husbands who came out to walk or be with us included Phillip Falterman, Jim Shackelford, Herb Stell, Gordon Jeffcoat, Al Vance, Glen Geraci, Keith Gillies (with Keagan) and Jeff Analla. Gina, Tammy’s sister and cancer survivor joined us as did, Dickie and AletteLyons. We liked our team and don’t think we didn’t walk! Martha hardly stopped since she likes it so well (which was more than okay with us), and later, Lindsay Trant and Erin Shackleford took their turns around the track. Offspring Michael Schoen, Susan Analla, Kristin Falterman and Jason Griffin (future team leaders?) joined us, too. So we didn’t take home any prizes, but if there had been one for team spirit, we would have had a good chance. We danced, cheered and competed all night. We are already talking about next year. I’ll have to tell you more later. ANNA MONICA, a resident of Garyville, writes this column every Wednesday for L’Observateur.