When Shirley White looked up at Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest peak on the African continent, towering over Tanzania’s landscape at 5,895 metres, (19,336 feet), she started walking.

Her mind made up, and determined to get as far as she could, she began an experience of a lifetime, one she feels privileged to share today.

During the interview, Mrs. White sat comfortably in the whicker chair, her light sweater worn over a blue polo shirt. Sunglasses shaded her eyes and her short graying hair was ruffled gently by the wind. She is not typically an individual that would come to mind when thinking about climbing a mountain.

“I’m not a superwoman,” Mrs. White joked. “But (climbing Mount Kilimanjaro) certainly did take going beyond what you’re comfortable with.”

This fall, she will be celebrating a milestone birthday. “I’m not sure I would want to say which one that is,” she said, and laughed. “You can say 50-plus.”

She has been living in Erin for the last 25 years with her husband John, sons Michael and Christopher and daughter Katie.

“I was a teacher, and I retired from teaching five years ago,” she advised.

But having decided that retirement wasn’t quite ready for her yet, she tried several different jobs and for the past two years she has worked as a personal support worker for Community Living Dufferin.

Mrs. White has been active to a degree her whole life. As a physical education teacher there was a certain amount of effort involved in the job, and she has participated in walking and running events over the years, the latest being her climb of Mount Kilimanjaro.

The climb has also fallen on a year of celebration for Mrs. White, on a more personal level.

“In 2000 I discovered a lump in my breast, and it did turn out to be breast cancer,” she said. Over the next eight months she endured a lumpectomy, chemotherapy and radiation. “I was lucky enough not to have my entire breast removed.”

Chemotherapy lasted five months. When her 21 rounds of radiation ended in December, she was declared cancer-free.

She retold her experience with a calm expression. What she said was a compilation of difficult experiences, with a silver lining.

“This is a special year for me too,” she said, smiling, “being cancer- free, becoming a survivor.”

Her family was supportive throughout the journey. Her lifestyle change included taking a year off work, during which constantly feeling sick and loss of her hair took their toll.

She says cancer is a life-changing experience. Sometimes it can be difficult to remember to hope.

“You’re going through all this and there is no guarantee that it’s going to work,” she commented, voicing her own past doubts. “There is always that psychological challenge of telling yourself you’re going to get through it.”

She is a firm believer in keeping a positive attitude, believing that statistically more people are becoming survivors of cancer and that you have to hope you are going to be one of them.

Last August, she was confronted with something else. The Grandmothers to Grandmothers campaign for the Stephen Lewis Foundation caught her attention. The campaign is to raise awareness and support in Canada for grandmothers in Africa, where as many as 11 million children have been orphaned by AIDS and warfare, leaving their grandmothers to care for them with no real means of employment.

“I think at some point you decide you want to make a contribution, and I am certainly at that point,” she said.

On her own, Mrs. White organized an expedition to Africa to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro, with a personal goal to raise $2,500 for Grandmothers to Grandmothers. Roughly 90% of that goal has been fulfilled to date.

“I am able and interested in helping others and I felt like it was something I could do,” she commented. “And to show women in middle age, grandmothers, that there is a lot that we can do.”

The climb to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro took five days, and it took one day to get back down.

“On the way up you have to go fairly slow as your body acclimatizes,” she said, smiling.

“You start off and it’s temperate rain forest, by the time you get to the top it was minus ten degrees Celsius and we were in winter clothes.”

She says the Grandmothers to Grandmothers campaign provided the motivation she needed to take on the challenge. The six months of preparation were focused on walking and running to keep up her level of fitness.

“I feel very privileged, with my health background and age and so on, to be able to do things like this.”

She will also be participating in the first Relay for Life in the Orangeville area this June, taking part in the Survivors walk and supporting her belief in finding a cure for cancer.