I've been thinking a lot about breast cancer lately.

One of my colleagues has just begun her battle and a recent college grad I know is already a survivor.

Today was a very special day. It was the day my mother-in-law celebrated her life 20 years after beating her own battle with breast cancer. Almost 40 of us came together at a local country club to fete her. My MIL was wearing her V necklace, a gift from my late FIL. The V to celebrate her five year anniversary and the seven diamonds set in the V to celebrate the years up to 12. As my SIL said, I'm sure her dad is looking down on us all from above, smiling.

Breast cancer will visit one in eight of us. Most of us have been touched by it already. To that point, my MIL put teddy bears wearing t shirts with the breast cancer logo on the tables to toast the number of women there today who had fought it.

This gathering was my MIL's closest friends, her Pan and Mahjong friends, her family members, her longtime friends, the people who have walked beside her all these years. Some of them I had not seen since my FIL's funeral nine years ago.

My MIL mentioned how there are two kinds of families -- those whose immediate family has been touched by breast cancer and those that have not. My MIL is and her mom was a survivor, her mom a two-time survivor. I'm sure my SIL and Aunt Janice think about this. And I think about it for our three daughters.