Mary Jane Sanders Memorial Scholarship

"ALS sucks" was the saying in my house. Especially as my mother began to worsen. She was a very active woman before all of it; she worked hard and loved her family fiercely, and every day, I strive to be more like her. My mother (as shown in the pictures I will be attaching) had a beautiful smile that she wielded freely, openly, and daily. My mother, through all the hospital visits, through the hardship and all the emotions that came with ALS, continued to smile despite it all. My father says that I got my smile from my mom, and what I hope most is that my smile not only resembles hers physically, but also resembles hers in frequency and power. She could light up a room, make people feel at ease, and bond with them through her smile, and going into hospitality, I hope my smile can do the same for people I meet and interact with. The prompt says "Mary Jane Sanders exemplified that the power of family can give you strength to push through adversity", and while my family likely gave my mom strength (she had said it many times), she multiplied that strength and gave it back tenfold to everyone in my family, including me. My drive to achieve what I want, my goals in life, and the job I want, have increased dramatically because of my mother. She poured gasoline on the fire, and all I want to do is to continue to make her proud, as if I can show her that I'm doing well, that I'm accomplishing what she knew I was capable of. There are parts of me that are saddened when I can't talk to her about my course, can't show her test grades, or gush about what I'm doing in school, whether it's tutoring or the literary magazine, but even that is outweighed by the feeling that I'm doing her proud. That's all I can hope for, and I will keep pushing for that, for greater heights and more happiness, for her. Hospitality and event planning (particularly for weddings, the field I want to go into) is the job where "smile even when it's all going wrong" is most common, because the goal is always to support the guest experience. They don't need to know when issues or catastrophes are happening behind the scenes; they just need to be taken care of, and while ALS sucks, it taught me a lot about finding the good in the bad and continuing to smile even when it feels like the world is crashing down around me. Nothing can ever replace my mom, but holding onto that and carrying it into the professional world feels a little bit like I get to keep her with me, and maybe show her to others, even if they might not know.