We’ve already talked a bit about how SuperJeweler.com is donating 20% of the sales on our pink jewelry to Susan G. Komen For The Cure. Many other organizations are doing in this for their own special reasons. Today I am going to talk about why we are doing this.

Her name was Betty Jean. She was a mother of three. Grandmother of five, including me. She was born right before The Great Depression. As one of eight mouths to feed, she and her seven brothers and sisters spent most of their childhoods very poor and often hungry. In fact, until she died, she still saved bacon grease in Folgers cans…a carry over from Depression-era conservation.

What she lacked in wealth, she made up for in sheer determination and values. One of her sage bits of advice was, “When your motivation is love, your actions are always meaningful.” Perhaps it was the love for her children and their need to have a father that led to her staying in an abusive relationship with a grandfather I never knew. A grandfather who could never hold a job, but always found money for alcohol. A grandfather who often hit her, and her children. And perhaps it was love that got up her nerve to divorce him in the early ’60s, figuring, finally, that no father is better than a bad father.

As a single mother providing for her three children, she worked 55-60 hour weeks on a Detroit assembly line. She was not assembling cars, but circuit boards for early computers. She worked in that factory for nearly 35 years – a feat that is almost unheard of in today’s workforce.

Through all of this, however, she always found time for her kids and, later, her grandkids. Getting them to stadiums to see their sports heroes play. Teaching tolerance in one of America’s most segregated cities, so that we would grow up prepared for an America of the future, not an America of the past. She sang lullabies, kissed boo-boos, wiped away tears, and lived for it, then served up homemade chocolate chip cookies.

Every thing I have learned about strength and perseverance, I have learned from her: Betty Jean.

On January 10, 2008, she lost her battle with cancer. I spoke to her that day. In between short breaths, her last words to me were: “Always be good.”

While the details of this story may be unique to me, many of you have your own Betty Jean. She is your mother, your grandmother, your aunt, or your sister. She is a beacon of hope in a sometimes dark world. And she is the one person you can count on for strength, when you think you have none left.

In 2008, more than 182,000 new cases of breast cancer will be diagnosed. It will be diagnosed in the people we love. It will be diagnosed in the people whom we feel can overcome anything. And, many times, this cancer will be the one obstacle they won’t be able to overcome.

Susan G. Komen For The Cure is dedicated to finding ways to prevent and cure breast cancer so that your Betty Jean will be there for you and your kids for many more years to come.

At SuperJeweler.com, our reasons for helping are personal. So, I ask you, if you are looking to purchase a piece of jewelry this month, please think pink. And together, maybe we can all help find a cure for breast cancer.