I am lucky enough to have a wife to bounce my thoughts off of. Many times I get what I think are “brilliant” ideas, and when I check with Barb, she sort of throws a wet blanket over the project. I must say, unfortunately, she is right way more often than I am! That being said, this time I hope I came up with a winner, because I thought of how to describe myself from the first stanza of South Pacific, the 1949 Broadway Musical and 1958 and 2001 films. The song starts like this:
“When the skies are brighter canary yellow, I forget ev’ry cloud I’ve ever seen, so they called me a cockeyed (foolish, ridiculous, absurd, a cockeyed idea) optimist, immature and incredibly green.”
In a July issue of the Community Courier, I read an excellent article by Ann Mead Ash about Izzy Newswanger of Akron (about 30 minutes west of Honey Brook) and his parents, Danielle and Jon. The article explained how Izzy, when he was five months old, stopped breathing for a time, and as a result suffered brain damage. The purpose of the article was to announce a 5K race (which has been run in prior years) to raise funds for Izzy’s special therapy that is not covered by insurance. After a couple of weeks and talking with Ann Ash and both of Izzy’s parents, I decided to go for it.
As you might know, many of my articles are from personal experience. Therefore, I decided I would not only add to the promotion of the race but see if my aging legs could go for 3.1 miles. I have only run two races in my life: a 10K, 10 years ago in Richmond, VA with 15,000 runners and a 5K race for charity eight years ago. I have already started to try to get into shape, and I have found some bad news that you probably already know. One’s body changes a lot in 10 years, and not for the better! The great thing about this race is you can walk, jog or run it.
The race is Sept. 19 at Loyd H. Roland Memorial Park, north of 11th Street in Akron, about 30 minutes west of Honey Brook. Registration begins at 8 a.m. Visit www.izzyssuperman5k.com.
Bring family, friends and enemies too. You may become friends with your enemies should they fall and you help them up, or if you provide them with water.
Jeff Hall, of Honey Brook, contributes columns to Berks-Mont Newspapers.
