Happy. Healthy. Heathen.

What a beautiful day for a bike ride!

Today was the Tour de Boro (although honestly it was more of a Tour de Christiana), a leisurely spring ride through the rolling hills of Rutherford County, benefitting the organization Special Kids, a nonprofit organization that provides therapeutic rehabilitation and professional nursing services to children with special needs.  It’s also a great way to kick off the spring riding season!

Because of a weather front that moved in last night, it was a bit dodgy getting up at 6:00 to 39 degrees.  But get up I did, and off to Barfield Park I went, bike on rack, coffee in hand, ready to get my ride on.

Within minutes of arriving and checking in, I heard my name called, and looked around and saw my friend Allison.

Alison has been a friend and a client for 5 or 6 years.  We chatted a minute and decided to ride together, as it seemed like we would ride at about the same pace.  We had the most delightful time riding and talking.  I’d like to share a bit of what she shared with me.

Alison is a veteran and has recently become involved with Ride2Recovery, an organization established to help injured veterans overcome obstacles they face, through the sport of cycling.  Alison has done a ride to NYC, the California coast, and the Gulf coast.  She shared some stories about some of the folks she has ridden with.  R2R provides and modifies bicycles for any manner of disability, and through donations and outside funding, there is no cost to the veteran.  Non-veterans are invited and encouraged to attend the structured rides offered around the country throughout the year, although there’s a fee associated with that.

She said the exertion, the camaraderie, the accomplishment are all helping her to process her overseas active duty experiences.  Specifically she said it helped her see that all of us, with our strengths and weaknesses, are all beautifully imperfect, and that each person’s life is of their own making.  My friend Alison has since spent a month or so in New Zealand, taking in the sights of that spectacular country.  It’s also led her to sell her home and work toward accomplishing a personal dream of owning her business.

I hope you’ll visit the website and consider whether this fits into your charitable giving.  We don’t always get to see how our contributions work, but today, for a few lovely spring hours, I got to see just that.

Thanks for reading!