ESU’s Lunafest

By Katie Johnstone
SC Staff Writer

“We are a society desensitized by numbers. Let me repeat them for you: 200, 2,000, 4,000 and 40,000.  Two hundred people die on average every year from airplane crashes; two thousand people were lost in Pearl Harbor or Titanic if you like that movie better, 4,000 lost on September 11 and 40,000 people (90% women) are lost to breast cancer each year.”

John Stanovick was married to Lucy Stanovick, an English professor at East Stroudsburg University, who died this past summer from stage IV breast cancer. John supports the Lucy Fund, which is a non-profit organization that raises funds for The National Foundation for Cancer Research. The fund has raised over 180,000 dollars in four years. All proceeds from Lunafest went to the Lucy Fund.

The event was held on October 18 at 4:00 PM in Beers Lecture Hall at East Stroudsburg University. Students paid seven dollars to attend. Students, Faculty and community guests watched nine short films: “Georgena Terry,” “Chalk,” “Self Portrait with Cows Going Home and Other Works,” “The Bathhouse,” “Flawed,” “Blank Canvas,” “Whakatiki: A Spirit Arising” and “Lunch Date.”  The films showed the struggles of women.

The films definitely got some chuckles, “awes” and applause at the end. They also were creative reminders of the issue resting at the bottom: Cancer. The C word is the elephant in the room. Stanovick stated, “40,000 means having ten ‘9/11s’ every year, eighteen pearl harbors and a plane crash every other day. If that was happening, you bet we as America would stop it real quick, but what are we doing to stop the real killer?”

To donate to the Lucy Fund, visit http://www.nfcr.org/get-involved/1004.

Email Katie at:
kmj8478@live.esu.edu