LEWISBURG — Bundled in long johns, jeans and leather jackets, motorcyclists will converge at the Country Cupboard Restaurant on New Year’s morning for the annual Polar Bear Ride.
The New Year’s Day ride, which can be termed a tradition after 15 years, is sponsored by the Lord’s Disciples Chapter of the Christian Motorcyclists Association. The event directs cash donations to some worthy person and canned goods and other food items to a local charity.
The 2009 ride will benefit Carol Flory, the local chapter’s secretary, who has been battling cancer and other misfortunes for the past year.
The week before Christmas, Flory and her husband, Bob, were getting ready for the club’s annual party.
“I felt humbled that they would consider honoring me this way,” she said. “It’s a good feeling that my friends felt they wanted to help us.”
Seated in the living room of her Sunbury home, with her husband and their dog Mack also on the couch, she talked about the trials of 2008.
“I can’t wait for this year to be over,” she said. “My father died in March, and two weeks after that, I was diagnosed with ovarian cancer.”
She went on to describe her treatment at Geisinger Medical Center, which included a regimen of chemotherapy and surgery.
“It played me out,” she admitted.
Most recently, she was hospitalized on Nov. 12 for additional surgery.
In addition to her health issues, her husband, a long-distance truck driver, wound up hospitalized as well. He contracted pneumonia while on the road and by the time he got home, was near collapse. He spent three weeks in the hospital suffering from organ failure.
As he recovered from that, surgeons had to remove his gall bladder.
“Through it all, friends from CMA visited him in the hospital,” Carol said. “They were very supportive.”
Carol hopes to return to her job at Sunbury Textile Mills, where she has worked for 30 years, and she hopes to see her grandchildren graduate and go to college.
Lenora Springfield, of Selinsgrove, outgoing president of the chapter, said Carol Flory’s 10 years as secretary have been a great help to her.
“She has such a positive attitude,” said Springfield. “It’s been a real blessing to watch her as she’s gone through all this.”
“I think we’re recognizing her for her courage.”
The Flory’s plan to attend the Polar Bear Ride, which starts with breakfast at the Country Cupboard on Route 15 north of Lewisburg at 9 a.m. Participants linger until 11, chatting and drinking coffee, and if the weather cooperates, they take a short ride around the area, always ending up at a doughnut shop on Route 15 just outside Lewisburg for more coffee.
Bill Renno, of Milton, who has organized the ride for several years, said riders come from as far as Hanover and Tunkhannock, and in previous years, riders have come from as far away as Connecticut, Maryland and Virginia. It’s not unusual for 50 or more to show up for breakfast and the ride.
Renno said non-CMA members are more than welcome to participate, and riding a motorcycle to the event is not required. Just as many people come to the breakfast in cars and trucks as by motorcycle, he said.
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Annual Polar Bear Ride to benefit cancer patient
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