How Running Can Save the World
- by: Maxine Crook, member of Give Girls A Chance Advisory Board
(previously published in Running Room magazine)
“Not me," I said. “I will not knit, and I will not run!” Tried ‘em, hated ‘em, can’t do them. “Get a grip! It’ll be “such fun!” my friend had said. Besides, it’s for a good cause....build schools and train teachers, so girls in Afghanistan and Africa, anywhere it's needed can get an education.
Who could refuse? And so it was that I joined a half dozen CBC colleagues to become a JeansMarine, a group of 100 + women training to run the Washington Marine Corps Marathon. Toronto physician Dr Jean Marmoreo, marathoner extraordinaire had teamed up with Homemaker’s magazine to found “Give Girls A Chance”, a new charity to fund education for the millions(!) of girls who do not, can not, go to school.
Yes, changing the world sounds impossible, but so did my running a marathon. I’d never even seen one!
I started training….well, kinda trained. Saturday mornings at the Running Room we had information sessions, then, while the group stretched and ran my friend and I went for croissants and coffee. Spring came, my friend quit (“it’s a cult”, she said, getting out her dictionary). “Cult”…a religious, unshakeable commitment to something.” Yep, it got that right! My commitment to GGAC compelled me to quit just reading the time/distance program in John Stanton’s Running: Start to Finish.
6 a.m! I’m skulking on the boardwalk, incognito, prepared to "run 10/walk1" (minutes), for its 3 km length. I run. I’m sweating. I think I’m going to throw up. I check my watch: 4 minutes, 12 seconds. I can’t do this!
Things improve when I swallow false pride and join the group. These Jean’s Marines women are fabulous! Fun, encouraging, inspiring! Marathon sign-up deadline comes. I pay the fee, but still won’t tell anyone…not family, not friends, that I am considering doing this.
Decision day: Sept 21st… the big test: do 32 km in less than 5 hours, the time you have to get to “the bridge”, mile 21, before it opens to traffic. Fail, and a waiting bus scoops you up and drives you to the finish line! Two new friends, Patti Walshe and Nancy Blair offered to run with me, feeding me sharkies, and jokes. I take 6 hours.
Next I send out scores of letters saying “I’ll run, you’ll pay, and together we can change the lives of many deserving girls living in desperate situations.”
Two days later, running slowly beside the lake, I swing around to follow a monarch
butterfly. Wham! I fall flat on my face, in the most incredible pain!. I almost pass out! I have shredded! my ham string.
I go to physio daily. I think of skinny young girls, walking miles for water. Of little girls watching brothers go to school. Educate a girl and poverty drops, birth rates drop, family health improves. So does the economy. I keep my plane reservation.
Oct. 26th, we are all in Washington, stoked, prepped, ready to go. I pick up my race number (177902), and my electronic tracking chip. Next morning: at Iwo Jima memorial in Arlington National Cemetery. The weather is perfect.
I am stunned at the scene! I can’t believe the music, the thousands of runners, cheering supporters, the palpable energy! I wish my grandchildren were her. Forget walking…it’s too slow. I start out running, showing off for the crowds cheering us – me – along. “You go girl”. “Lookin’ good, lookin’ smooth” “Oprah did it, I swear you doin’ it faster, honey.” It was a blast! No matter that I fell behind my pace bunny and our group, and I was alone. Just let me make that bridge!!
“Sorry ma’am”, the big marine says, “you got a nice bus waiting over there, will take you to the finish”. “The bus is not an option”, I say, plunging along side bridge traffic.
I remember the cool breeze off the river and how good it felt. I couldn’t run any more. I just walked. I was dizzy… 8 hours without food. I thought about all those refugee women, walking for days with their children, through waterless, war-torn hell-holes. They didn’t quit, I tell myself.
4 miles to go. As I approach the end, a marine’s photographer ran out. “You’re the last one. Will you carry this flag across the finish line?”
You bet your boots, I will! Adrenaline and pride are amazing energizers. I ran like a greyhound, holding the American flag, a huge smile on my face. I was a shade under 7 hours. I felt great! I still do!
Best: I had raised over $13,200 to “Educate A Girl. Change the World,” the Give Girls A Chance motto is verifiable. (see World Bank and UNICEF web sites). Jeans Marines plus other donors have raised more than $150,000. We won't quit. Please join us.
(Maxine Crook completed the Marine Corps Marathon in 2002)
To make GGAC your marathon charity, go to: www.givegirlsachance.org
(2008 update. Maxine, a grandmother and now with a double hip replacement walked the STWM 5K and is not planning to stop yet)