Inspired Dancing to Find a Cure for Cancer
By Kris Hill
The Covington Reporter
Tricia Grove-Johnson told her sister to go find a cure for cancer.
So, in 2002, Elizabeth Lanning took the suggestion literally and came up with a fundraiser called Dance for a Cure that is now in its eighth year with the event slated for 7 p.m., May 1 at the Bagley Wright Theater in Seattle.
“I was very sick,” said Grove-Johnson, a Ravensdale resident. “I had been diagnosed with stage four uterine sarcoma. My survival chances weren’t great.”
In fact, her chances of survival were less than 1 percent, but she “didn’t really take that to heart because that’s just not me.”
“I was bound and determined to beat it. And to beat it by myself,” Grove-Johnson said. “My family wanted to help. I didn’t really want any help. I was a little stubborn. My sister, who is my best friend, was continually on me and said, ‘What can I do?’”
And that’s when, in an effort to get her sister to leave her alone, Grove-Johnson said to Lanning, “You can go out and find a cure.”
Lanning runs a dance studio in Bellevue and she decided to put on a dance performance with the proceeds going toward the Fred Hutchison Cancer Center.
Her dance students would deliver meals to Grove-Johnson’s front door and send “buckets and buckets of cards” telling her of their progress on preparations for the fundraiser.
“The first year was an incredible success,” Grove-Johnson said. “With three months preparation these kids raised $12,000.”
Grove-Johnson went to the first event, watched the show while trying not to identify herself, “then I cried through the whole thing.”
In 2003, Lanning’s students went to her and asked if they were going to do it again.
“It started out as a tribute to her sister and it has become a community event,” Grove-Johnson said. “It blows my mind the altruism of these kids. It’s more about who they’ve seen in their lives affected by cancer.”
Since that first year, Dance For A Cure has grown by leaps and bounds, with a vision statement and more partnerships with groups like Gilda’s Club, Locks of Love, Pete Gross House and others.
“It’s just getting bigger and bigger,” Grove-Johnson said. “Talking with the kids, they want it to continue on, they want it to continue making a difference.”
Dance For A Cure has gone beyond raising money during an annual event to, “the community coming together and helping every day of the year.”
These days the e-mails Grove-Johnson gets about the event “are just incredible” with people no longer asking how to get tickets, but instead asking how they can help.
“With the economy being the way it is, people may not be able to give the funds,” she said. “But, if they have the time and the will to serve (they can). And, it just puts more fire in (the student’s) bellies.”
There will be dozens of dancers involved, including Grove-Johnson, who will be performing with Amanda McAndrew who is an alumnus of Lanning’s business, Elizabeth’s Dance Dimensions.
“That’s where I grew up dancing and then taught,” McAndrew said. “I grew up admiring Trish because she was such a strong person. Her story now proves just how strong. Now here she is, still intense in everything she does.”
Dancers between the ages of 6 and 19 will perform as well as 15 members, including Grove-Johnson, of the MO-DAZZ alumni group that is made up of Lanning’s former students will perform. There are a number of other featured performers slated to take the stage.
A former University of Washington cheerleader, Grove-Johnson has done some dancing in her day, including performing with the Seattle Sonics dance team until she decided she wanted to be an attorney.
Grove-Johnson, 40, works in private practice in Renton and has continued her career and dancing while fighting through a myriad of aggressive and even experimental treatments to beat the cancer as well as the side effects of those treatments.
“Cancer sucks, I’m not going to paint a pretty picture,” she said. “I despise it. But, cancer has not beaten me.”
What has come out of it, all the negative, frustrating times during the battle against cancer, Grove-Johnson said, is a mission of service in Dance For A Cure and beyond.
Last year, she said, the event raised $75,000.
“We’re always hoping to do better than the last year,” she said. “We really believe $100,000 is not out of reach. If the kids sweat means anything, then, I think we can do it.”
Dancers lift Lexie Hewitt during rehearsals for Dance for a Cure set for May 1 at the Bagley Wright Theater in Seattle.
