A great day!

Well, next week at this time I hope to be about 80 or so miles into our fundraiser. The temps seem to be cooling a bit so that is relief, mid 80's will have to do it looks like. Today I started my 2 week vacation, I work for a gentleman by the name of Mike Steven. Mike owns numerous businesses, I am his corporate electrician and we also have an Electrical Company we are partners in called Steven Energy. Anyhow, as I leave today Mike says " good luck and be safe, oh by the way here is a check for $5,000 to the Wounded Warrior Project". I didn't know whether to hug him or slap myself to make sure it wasn't a dream. That not only broke the $20,000 mark, but we are currently at $22,790.00 that means only $2,210 to go and we crush $25,000!!!!

I must admit that in the last couple of weeks I have had my doubts about whether or not the $25,000 was achievable. Then last night GoRun Wichita a new running store here in town does a 3 mile fun and raffle and we make nearly $1000 there. I knew after last night that we still had a chance, the generosity of those who showed up was tremendous. With Mike giving us that $5000 today it basically just gave me that final push I needed. Mentally, I feel the run will go alot smoother if our goal is met prior to me starting, that way I am not stressing the entire time. For those of you reading this, most likely you have contributed and I must take a second to say thank you from the bottom of my heart. When Angel, Dan, Kyle and I decided this was a feasible task we knew it would take a ton of people to pull it off. We currently have 9 full pages of names who have donated, many of you multiple times! Many of you have worked hard through e-mail, facebook, mini-fundraisers etc etc to help us get this far and I thank you. I am truly in all of your debt and if you ever need help with anything please call on me and if it is within my power or means I will go out of my to assist you, I promise.

All I am asking is 6 more days of fundraising or $2,210. Once we reach that goal and we will, I would obviously like to keep going, but $25,000 is what we need. I feel I am ready to do my part, I know it will not be easy and the pain will most likely be the worst I have ever felt, the fatigue will horrendous and my mind will get weak at times. To combat all those negatives, i have probably the best crew ever assembled and more runners than I can name coming out to help. We have had people volunteer to drive from everywhere and people coming up from as far as Texas just to run a few miles with me. I have been racking my brain the last couple of weeks trying to figure out ways to motivate myself and the other night it hit me. I was watching a documentary on the Iraq war and a Marine who had both legs blown off by an IED was asked by a reporter if he had any regrets, his answer was "my only regret is I could not take the full force of the explosion and my buddy next to me died, that is regret I live with daily". The freaking Marine had NO LEGS and was 21 years old and all he thought of was the Lance Corporal- his brother- next to him. So when my pain gets so intense i begin to whine, I will think of that Marine who lived and has no legs, because I should feel guilty for complaining about the pain, he would likely pay $25,000 to feel that pain in his legs again. Thats all for now. Semper Fi