Stem cell testing

Today was the huge stem cell testing for Luise and Emil, the kids I mentioned before who have Fanconi anemia, a very rare (1000 people world wide?), genetic disorder where their bodies slowly stop producing blood cells. We thought we'd dodge by after church, pop in to give 5 ml blood, and walk home. Plenty of time, the collection was set up for 10am-4pm. We got there at 2:30 to find a line outside of the school they were doing it in, clear across the park in front of it, and all the way down the block to the next street! Probably 400 people out there, and more inside. The line moved pretty fast (good, since we had the four kids with us after an already long day). Inside it was crazy, with tons of tables set up in the auditorium to register people, and then the bloodletters of course. My veins are extremely clear--it looks like someone drew them on with marker--and I've never had problems giving blood before, but for some reason nothing came out when they stuck me. They were about to give up when finally some dripped out. DH had no problem (other than extreme squeamishness over giving blood at all--I was rather proud of the fact that he did it at all. We'll just hope his blood is so unique that he never gets asked to actually donate.) Anyway, there were maybe 2000 people who turned out to help these two kids. It was really overwhelming to me to see the support they have in this town. We know them, but most of these people didn't--they were total strangers who felt compelled to help. I hope, hope, hope the right two people showed up today, one to match each child. And maybe some of the other people in other places who need stem cells can find a match today as well.