31 years ago on August 5th I was finishing my California- Massachusetts run. As I enter some things onto these blogs I will add in some pictures from now and then and a bit of an insight into the answers to the 2 questions people ask me all the time. 1: Are you F....n nuts? 2:why do you want to do this? The answer to the first question would be--no more nuts than anybody else who stepped out from the "norm" would appear to be. The answer to the second question is a bit deeper and I hope is something that you will remember whenever you question what motivates me. My true belief is that God has given me two gifts 1. my health, which I take too much for granted too often and 2. an ability to run and run and run. I firmly believe I was given these things in order to help others. I also feel I dropped the ball for the last 31 years and it's time I picked it back up again. This is about as "heavy" of an entry that I'll make into my blogs, and I may offend people with these things, but, this is what is in my heart as I head into the next big run.
On a lighter note the pictures you are looking at are the me of today and the me of 31 years ago. Can you tell which is which? The double picture is 2 shots taken in Denver in 1978. The other pic is me running in Foxboro in July 09. In the double picture I had hair and a 28 inch waist. In the current photo--well--the hair thing. What I tell people is that I used to be able to have an afro but now all I can muster up is a half-fro. In the current photo the size of my waist is determined by which part of my stomach I want to consider to be my waist. So it's somewhere between a 32 and a 30something.
The one thing that is the same in these pictures is my heart and the desire to do something with my running to help others in a BIG way. I'm also excited about the fact that through the blogs and your comments and emails you can join me either via the computer and/or on the road somewhere. I know for a fact that people from all over the east coast, plus Michigan, Illinois, Colorado, Ohio, Nevada and California are reading these entries and I invite you to come along and feel free to stay in touch. tardy4@comcast.net
