More aware of breast cancer following month of ‘awareness’

It used to be the predominant colors of October were black and orange, for Halloween and, of course, the World Series champion San Francisco Giants. Now October must blend pink -- the color of Breast Cancer Awareness Month -- into its palette.

The Review-Journal pulled it off by printing a special pink newspaper on Sept. 30, with 100 percent of retail sales donated to the Southern Nevada Affiliate of Susan G. Komen for the Cure. It wasn't long before sports teams in and around Las Vegas began taking on a pinkish hue that would have impressed George Costanza of "Seinfeld" to no end.

I heard from the soccer teams at Rancho and Canyon Springs high schools that played in pink jerseys and raised $1,000; from the Las Vegas Locomotives, who replaced their lime green end zone pylons and goal post pads with pink ones; from the Green Valley and Coronado girls volleyball teams, which wore pink jerseys on "Dig Pink Night"; from the Arbor View High softball team, which hosted a pink-themed clinic; from the UNLV men's soccer team (pink warmup tops and jerseys), women's soccer team (pink tops), football team (Breast Cancer Awareness Halftime Show vs. Texas Christian) and volleyball team (pink jerseys, shoelaces and hair bows); from the Las Vegas Bowl, which provided 2,400 local high school football players with pink ribbon helmet decals; and last but not least but certainly fastest, the Al-Anabi Racing team, whose Top Fuel dragster driven by series points leader Larry Dixon sported a pink logo and ribbon for the Las Vegas Nationals.

I thought I also might hear from John Mellencamp, informing that his monster hit inspired by a man holding a cat with an interstate runnin' through his front yard might take on a dual meaning in the month just completed. I didn't -- but found an Internet firm called "RentLizard.com" that sponsored a "Little Pink Houses Breast Cancer Awareness" campaign.

I also made a wrong turn while trying to find the Clark High gymnasium and wound up wandering the school halls. I noticed the security at Clark being a little lax and that the sophomore class had put up banners in support of Breast Cancer Awareness and coach Linda Silver and the volleyball team's monthlong commitment to the cause.

Parents of Clark players, led by Jodie Diamant (daughter of Jerry and Lois Tarkanian), arranged for their daughters to wear pink socks and pink hair ribbons and made pink-themed care packages for road games that included pink treats and black-and-white facts about breast cancer, such that more than 190,000 women were diagnosed with it last year and that 40,000 died. In Southern Nevada, the estimates were 1,350 and 330, respectively.

Thankfully, Chargers defensive specialist Danika Ozaki said, it wasn't 331. Her grandmother, Audrey Johnson, was diagnosed with breast cancer nearly 10 years ago, not so much as a result of any awareness campaign but by dumb and life-saving luck when her doctor discovered a lump during a routine checkup. Two months later she underwent a double mastectomy. She has been living cancer-free ever since.

"No one should have to die from this disease," Johnson said as she watched her granddaughter scurry around the court.

Bryton Benda, one of the Clark seniors, said the most important thing she learned about breast cancer during awareness month is how to give herself a self-examination. "Before we did this, I didn't know how," she said.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure and all that, but sometimes when one is young and invincible and Ashlee Simpson has a new CD out (yeah, I know, bad analogy), proverbs, weights and measures can get in the way of a good time.

"Some of the mothers felt it was important for the girls to understand what Breast Cancer Awareness Month is and the significance of pink," said Diamant, whose daughter, Michelle, plays for Clark. "Many did not know what it was all about."

On the way home from the game, I kept thinking about what Audrey Johnson said. "No one should have to die from this disease." It got me to thinking.

The next morning, I made an appointment for a colonoscopy consultation I had been putting off since April.

I go in on Tuesday.

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ron Kantowski can be reached at rkantowski@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0352.