Bridge Run Redux

 I wrote an article for the Cooper River Bridge Run (CRBR) online magazine you can find here. It was much condensed so I thought I'd post my original version below. It was my intent to relay some of the themes of this blog while remembering my first bridge run ever...as an amputee. My blog post about the 2010 CRBR is here.

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I am standing on two good feet at a place I was told I would never be again. It is chilly and overcast and I am trying to keep warm, hands under arms, looking out on a sea of faces. All colors, sizes, shapes; a forty thousand voice chorus in a harmony of purpose.

It is the starting line of the 2010 Cooper River Bridge Run.

It is a good day to run. 

Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these broken wings and learn to fly.
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to arise.

- Sir Paul McCartney 

Thoughts flood my mind, some I embrace, others are too strong and I put them away. This will be my first CRBR as a new runner, the old one now a living memory. When I thought I could love running no more, it left only to return to show me more than I could have possibly imagined, could not have imagined had I not gone down this path.

Our sweet national anthem is sung, and in my odd configuration only my right leg has intense goose bumps. Then we are running, the ebb and flow as we find our pace. I tap a shoulder to steady myself as my right foot, made of plastic, carbon fiber, and stainless steel, is slow to brake. 

We rise above the harbor, flying above the gulls searching below. Up. Up. Up. Cresting the Cooper River, we turn into the city, waves of footsteps beating the pavement like wings of birds in migration. I hear voices of encouragement that drive me forward. Faster. Higher. Stronger. Embrace this day, this gift. Life.

“Now I will turn the miracle into routine. The amazing will be seen every day.”

- Yann Martel

I cross the finish line and do not quite believe the time I have run. A small wow escapes me. In less than one year after my foot amputation, I have crossed this river, run this bridge, become this new runner. One race ends, another begins. Imagine what you can do, then do it. Because you can.

Fly.