L Magazine Lincoln: The Gift of Life
Photo: Tricia Dunn
It all started in March 2009 over lunch in the food court at Westfield Gateway Mall.
Tricia Dunn and Delmer Esters were taking a break during EducationQuest Foundation’s KnowHow2GO event at Gateway. The event, part of the Foundation’s campaign to get middle and high school students interested in college, was organized by Dunn. Esters volunteered to come along and help.
Though they worked together, Dunn and Esters didn’t know each other well. Esters, a college planning specialist, worked on one floor while Dunn, the director of media relations, worked on another.
Dunn knew that Esters was on intensive kidney dialysis and had been on the transplant list for the past two years. She started asking questions, hoping to learn more about his progress toward a transplant.
“Delmer has a billion friends, so I wondered if anyone volunteered to give him their kidney,” Dunn said. “So, I asked him his blood type.”
Ester’s blood type is A+, the same as Dunn’s.
Read more at L Magazine Lincoln.