10 Miles 4 Portland's Homeless

I was going to wait to post this until I had a video ready from all the footage I shot with the GoPro, but I haven't had time to work on it at all, and time is wasting on my memory. Anyway, on with the run.

Most of you know that last year for Marion's 30th birthday she ran 30 miles. We made a bit of an event out of it, invited some friends to run to celebrate and we called it 3(30) or 3 thirties which stands for 30 years, 30 miles, and 30 blessings. 1 mile for every year, and one blessing for every mile. This year, Marion wanted to carry on the tradition, but in a different way. Instead of having a party for her, and spending alot of money on "things" and consumables, she wanted to bless other people. She also wanted to have more people be involved and included, so she shortened the route to a single 10 mile lap around the Portland water front. So this year's event was chosen to help out Portland's homeless, and so came 10 Miles 4 Portlands Homeless...

Marion decided that the Portland Rescue Mission was to be the benefactor of any donations received, either monetary or clothing and toiletries as they would best be able to distribute what was collected. This was to be more of an "event" this year, with the entry fee to run the 10 miles a donation. Didn't matter what you brought to donate, you could participate.

On the morning of January 15th, 2011, we gathered at Willamette Park, the weather was fair, about 50 degrees, no rain, cloudy skies, and was looking to be the start of a beautiful January day considering how cold and wet last years run was.  We had over 30 people show up to either run, walk, bike, help and more importantly, donate. After some coffee, bagels and other assorted breakfast snacks, we had a quick meeting about the route, a few photos, and off we ran.

Running... Ugh... LOL... I don't very much like running, however, I have been running once or twice a week, and I promised Marion that I would run the event if we had enough help, which of course we did. So we headed down the bike path towards the Sellwood bridge, the sun was still working its way up the horizon, but obscured by the cloud cover. A very light misty rain was falling but unnoticable as it wasn't too cold. I had never travelled across the Sellwood bridge in anything other than a vehicle, it is a nerve wrecking experience in a vehicle let alone on the narrow sidewalk. It is a very old and narrow bridge that is pretty high off the water. As the bridge is being replace in a few years and we may not include it on next years route, I took the time to enjoy the view, occasionally running in the traffic lane to take some video of the runners crossing the bridge.

Coming off the bridge takes you to the Springwater Corridor, which is for lack of a better word, fairly boring, its long, straight, and the only thing other than river and trees that you see until you get to the Ross Island bridge is Oaks Park, and that is right at the beginning. The run at this point had been going at a fairly brisk pace, a little faster than I would have liked, but as I wasn't worried about having to walk later, I just kept running (All the while thinking like Dory, "Just keep running, just keep running just keep running...").

Approaching the Ross Island bridge was a welcome sight, as it is approximately 4 miles into the run and the end of most of the boredom as you enter downtown Portland. Just past the bridge you get back on the bike path right in front of OMSI and you are right next to the water almost all of the rest of the way. The path is mostly straight till the turning point but runs past a few more bridges including the Marquam, Hawthorne, Morrison, Burnside all the way to the Steel bridge. The path also jogs onto a section that is docked and floats right on the river.  The bridges of Portland are always beautiful and alway fun to run past and on.

Once to the Steel bridge, that is our crossing point and we ran across to the west side of the waterfront where we all gathered and took a short break, approximately mile 6. The rest of the run was run back to Willamette Park on the west side of the Willamette River, under the same bridges, but with a different view, past some downtown shopping, past OHSU, through the Macadam area which takes you back to the park. This last part of the run for me was spent mostly walking as my calves had told me that it was no longer time to be running. Never the less, I finished the 10+ miles even if I was the last one in.

It is important to note that while the route is a beautiful one, it is also where most of the homeless hang out. Nearly every bridge we run under has homeless people living under them, as well as any place along the path that might provide some amount of shelter from the elements. We ran by many people that Portland Rescue Mission tries to help on a daily basis. The only thing I could think while running past them was "Praise the Lord for giving us the ability to run, to have shelter, heat, food and other basic things that these people need on a daily basis. We truly take some of these things as a given when in reality many of us are only a few months worth of paychecks away from being homeless. Thank you God! We are truly blessed"

At the end of the run, there was an overwhelming pile of clothing and toiletries that people had donated, and a jar full of money. It was a pretty awesome sight to see, and amazing that my wife's heart is so big that she would skip a birthday party to instead put together an event to support some people that need it more than us.

The time had come to tear down the tent, pack everything in the trailer and head to Portland Rescue Mission to drop off the donations. As we were tearing down we realized we had 2 boxes of still warm coffee, a bunch of bagels and cream cheese packets, and other various food items. Marion asked what we should do with all the extra food and I piped up and said lets take it to the people we were running for. So we headed to the bridges and armed with coffee and bagels, brightened the day for some of Portland's homeless. They were more than happy to accept our offer which warmed our hearts more than drinking the coffee would have.

After that we arrived at the Portland Rescue Mission and started unloading the truck and the trailer where we happily dropped off 98 pounds of clothing, 42 pounds of toiletries and $108.

All in all it was a fantastic day, very successful in my humble opinion, and I know that Marion is already scheming for her next birthday and what event we will definitely be putting on. I know that the momentum that she has been generating means that next years even will be even bigger and will hopefully benefit even more people!

Congrats on your 31st birthday sweety. I love you!