PORT HAWKESBURY - With social-distancing and gathering-limit restrictions in place as Nova Scotia teetered on the cusp of COVID-19's third wave, local volunteers and a Cape Breton-wide charitable organization had to use some creativity and ingenuity to grant the wish of a local teenager with a rare form of a well-known disease.

Now 19, John Michael Kennedy was first diagnosed with Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) at the age of 22 months. Occurring in only one out of 3,500 males worldwide, DMD is considered one of the nine rarest forms of muscular dystrophy on the planet. 

While Kennedy was able to walk for the first 14 years of his life, his limbs soon weakened to the point where he required a motorized wheelchair to have any form of mobility. At the same time period, according to his father John Kennedy, the Port Hawkesbury family learned that they had qualified for a trip to Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida, thanks to the Cape Breton branch of the Make-A-Wish Foundation. 

Although this journey was not seen through due to the logistical difficulties of making the voyage south, the Kennedy family worked with the Make-A-Wish Foundation to come up with a substitute wish that would see John Michael embark on a day-long shopping spree in Sydney.

When COVID-19 and its accompanying Public Health protocols scuttled this idea, Cape Breton branch president Cathy Sutherland worked with her colleagues to purchase the items on John Michael's wish list - including a large-screen TV, a LEGO set and several albums by his favourite musicians - and present them to him at the Port Hawkesbury Fire Hall on a sunny Saturday morning in April.

This presentation followed a parade through the streets of Port Hawkesbury, led by the town's volunteer firefighters with assistance from the Strait Area Transit (SAT) Cooperative, which provided a special vehicle to enable John Michael and his family to get a bird's-eye view of all the activity.