Well as many of you already know, I left for the Race on Sep 1. Today, Sep 4, I will meet up with the other logistics coordinator, squad leaders, and all the team leaders and treasurers. It's been a rough past few days. I have the sadness of leaving friends and family behind for the next 11 months. With that comes a variety of emotions and as you can imagine, is quite difficult at times. However, I have this other emotion because I'm with this new awesome 64 member "family" that I get to spend these life-changing 11 months with. It's a crazy mix of emotions spinning around inside me.
Right before I left home, my Grandma Nancy (above) wrote me an amazing poem. I didn't even know she was much of a poet, but this poem was incredible. I was named after my Grandpa Eddie who died before I was born so I never had the privilege of meeting him.
She entitled the poem "Because Eddie Said So" and the poem took me through the year 1976 when the Bicentennial quarters were released. "Then a guy named Eddie devised his own fix, he decided to save them". And so it began – Nancy and Eddie started saving quarters. At this point, Nancy had no idea why they were saving quarters. She asked him one day as the collection of quarters started to grow and "he answered that he didn't quite know, but maybe someday on a trip they would go". Just one year later, "Eddie took an unexpected trip, and without Nancy, or Scott, or Dena, and he didn't even need the quarters". Ever since then, Grandma Nancy has saved nearly every Bicentennial and State quarter. She continues on to say that "they never will be spent on anything but a trip. She's been on a mission for 35 years… Edward this is the trip that I know Eddie would be the most proud to say he had a part in".
So then it happened, she uncovered two boxes in front of her and right in front of me there were those quarters – nearly 800 of them all sorted into little containers. I can't even explain how I felt. My Grandma Nancy is one of the most thoughtful, loving and caring, helpful, selfless people that I know and I am proud that she is a part of my life in huge ways.
This is just one of the many goodbyes that was incredible and brought tears to my eyes. Thank you to everyone who sent notes to my mom for me to read on the field (I have to wait until I arrive in Guatemala and get my tent set up to read them so the rest of my squad mates that I am rooming with don't think I am weird when I start crying!). I thank God every day for giving me the best friends and family ever. You guys rock!
