Bringing a Smile with a Book

January is a special month for the Timberwolves FastBreak Foundation and sponsor American Family Insurance. Throughout WolvesCare month, the focus is on events that service, support and encourage Minnesota youth suffering from terminal or long-term illness.

Among the most special of events occurred Wednesday afternoon in Minneapolis, when Wolves players Greg Buckner and Michael Doleac joined TV analyst Jim Peterson at the Ronald McDonald House for a Reading Time Out.

Located on Oak Street near the University of Minnesota, the Ronald McDonald house is a home away from home for families in need of medical assistance. The program started in 1974 in Philadelphia when an Eagles player searched for a home close to a hospital for a family of a sick child. Here in Minneapolis, the Ronald McDonald House has served the community since 1979, and is in close proximity to the University of Minnesota Fairview Children's Hospital and Minnesota Children's Hospital.

"Basically, if families have a child that's facing a serious or life-threatening pediatric illness, we house the entire family," said Josh Williams, marketing and communications manager of the House. "The focus really is to stay together as a family here and we want to offer as much support as we can."

The Wolves, for their part, were very excited to offer just a moment of respite.

"Ronald McDonald House is an amazing organization," said Petersen, who began working with the Ronald McDonald house as an NBA player in the 1980s. "I've been involved with this stuff for 27 years now, and I've seen how these people save lives and they help transform kids."

Indeed, hoping to deliver a few smiles to several courageous children between the ages of 7-16, Buckner, Doleac and Petersen arrived in the early afternoon, gathered the kids and engaged in conversation for a few minutes. Afterwards, Buckner and Doleac proceeded to read "The 3 Snow Bears" as the children looked on. Both players paused frequently throughout the reading to engage their audience, implanting jokes and random thoughts that seemed to disarm the children and make for a poignant interaction.

"The kids love it when players come in, and it's neat because the players are role models," said Williams. "To be able to see them reading and to show the importance of reading in their lives, kids are going to watch what adults do and they're going to mimic that a lot. And these players are great with the kids."

"Greg and Michael are so natural with the kids," echoed Petersen. "That's what's so nice about the players we have on our roster: They're willing to go out and do a lot of stuff. They come here willingly. They give up themselves and they connect; they don't just come here and spend time and want to get out. It's great to see."

After the reading, Petersen conducted a Q&A with the children before awarding prizes, and subsequently, all parties moved over to several Wolves' decorated tables to color in parts of winter animals for a large mural. The kids received prize packs, yearbooks, two books, posters, stickers, a backpack, tickets to the Wolves-Suns game on Jan. 23, t-shirts and, most importantly, a chance to smile.

"Sometimes in the middle of the season it seems like wins and losses are the most important thing, but when you come to a place like this you realize what's really important," Petersen continued. Families go through some very tough times here, but there is also a lot of good that happens for these kids here."

Kids from all over the world and their families stay in one of 48 rooms at the Ronald McDonald House, whether treatment takes a few weeks or a couple of years.

As executive director of the Ronald McDonald House Meg Katzman explained that donations come in privately, from corporations, from special events and from the canisters at all McDonalds locations where you may drop your loose change. Last year, the Ronald McDonald house received approximately $425,000 just in change from McDonalds locations, and expects that number to rise considerably as new security measures are taken. Employees work hard to handle such financial details so that the emphasis for the families can stay where it needs to be.

"We want parents to be able to go to the hospital and worry about absolutely nothing when they come back," said Williams. "When they come home maybe at 5:30 p.m. they have a warm meal ready for them, they have a family activity after the meal. We have all the groceries ready for them, they can work out down in the basement, they can have their kids can go to school at the same time ... everything is taken care of for them."

Because, truly, when a kid gets sick, it affects everbody.

"The thing about cancer kids is that it impact everybody else in the family: the moms, dads, brothers, sisters and extended family," said Petersen. "They are instructing everybody about the value of life. It's an amazing process that happens here."

Petersen, Buckner, Doleac, the FastBreak Foundation and American Family Insurance were thankful to be a part of that process for a few hours on a Wednesday afternoon.