The Ben Comen Story

Ben Comen might hold the record as the slowest high school cross country runner in the world.  In a typical 3.1 mile race, he takes 40-42 minutes to finish. There is, however, a catch to this inspirational story because Ben Comen is no ordinary runner.

Ben Comen was born with cerebral palsy. He has limited control of his arms and the stiffness in his legs make even walking a strenuous task. Leg braces and physical therapy help improve his functioning but can not change his circumstances.

"I'm more relaxed when I run. When I run, nothing bothers me much." Ben exclaimed with enthusiasm when asked why he enjoyed running so much.

For as long as he could remember, Ben craved to be part of a sports team but no one wanted someone like him to handicap their teams. At best, coaches were only willing, out of pity, to allow him a spot on the bench or to be their water boy. They did not want him to actually participate. His parents would go out of their way to enlist Ben in one of the school's sports teams, but no one took him in until Chuck Parker, the high school cross country coach at Hanna High School did so.

From the moment Ben joined his high school cross country team in eighth grade, his story began to impact others in the school and community. Ben took his role on the team very seriously. Waking up before dawn on most days, he would train on his own, jogging around the community of Anderson, South Carolina. Some days, his siblings would join in. But most often, he trained on his own.

On race day, Ben would line up with everyone else at the starting line. As soon as the starter's gun sounded, Ben would be quickly left behind while the other runners powered ahead of him. Within the first few minutes, Ben would be running alone over the uneven ground of the cross country course. Ben’s goal would always be to try beating his own personal best time, generally around 40-42 minutes for a 3.1 mile race.

Because of his cerebral palsy, Ben falls often and falls hard.  He doesn’t have the reaction time necessary to prevent it.  Anything can trip him up from a twig to an uneven clump of grass.

"I've been coaching cross country for 31 years," says Hanna's Chuck Parker, "and I've never met anyone with the drive that Ben has. I don't think there's an inch of that kid I haven't had to bandage up."

But not before he finishes the race.  Ben hasn’t quit once.  When he falls and goes through the 15 second process of getting back up and getting his bloodied knees back underneath him and stable again, “Words can’t describe it.” His mother says.  “I have seen grown men just stand there and cry.”

To Ben, there was no such thing as quitting. He had been given the privilege of racing despite his handicap, and he was not about to ever quit.  At most races, after the other runners finished the race, they would re-run the same race route and catch up with Ben to 'run him home'.

Ben’s story is wonderful and inspirational but would not be complete without acknowledging the contribution of all those who stood with him along the way, especially his family and coach Parker. In honor of all of these people, Ben and his family have started a nonprofit foundation designed to honor those who give their all - on the course and off. The Ben Comen, Living Without Limits Fund of the Foothills Community Foundation seeks to provide information and resources to challenged athletes, and to recognize their accomplishments and the accomplishments of those who support them.

Ben’s story has inspired not only his community but many others as well.  He has met with President George Bush, and Kevin Cosner has not only donated to his foundation but has attended events in Anderson, South Carolina.

There are plenty of people in the world like Ben who face challenges every day.  Some are born with their challenges and some face them as the result of an accident or disease or in the service of our country. It’s good to know that the Coach Parkers of the world are out there to stand by them and believe in them.

And by the way, Hanna High is also the home of a mentally challenged man known as Radio, who has been the football team's assistant for more than 30 years. This is the same Radio who was portrayed in the 2003 movie by that name staring Cuba Gooding Jr. and Ed Harris.

Be inspired everyone, be like coach Parker and have a great day.

The Folded Napkin

This weeks Monday Morning Motivational Minute came to me directly from a good friend and a good man I know.  I don't know where he found it but I am thankful he did and grateful that he sent it to me.

Enjoy.  Nothing I can can say will make it better than it already is.

A Truckers Story

If this doesn't light your fire ... your
wood is wet!

I try not to be biased, but I had my doubts about hiring Stevie. His placement counselor assured me that he would be a good, reliable busboy.

But I had never had a mentally handicapped employee and wasn't sure I wanted one. I wasn't sure how my customers would react to Stevie.

He was short, a little dumpy with the smooth facial features and thick-tongued speech of Downs Syndrome. I wasn't worried about most of my trucker customers because truckers don't generally care who buses tables as long as the meatloaf platter is good and the pies are homemade.

The four-wheeler drivers were the ones who concerned me; the mouthy college kids traveling to school; the yuppie snobs who secretly polish their silverware with their napkins for fear of catching some dreaded "truck stop germ" the pairs of white-shirted business men on expense accounts who think every truck stop waitress wants to be flirted with. I knew those people would be uncomfortable around Stevie so I closely watched him for the first few weeks.

I shouldn't have worried. After the first week, Stevie had my staff wrapped around his stubby little finger, and within a month my truck regulars had adopted him as their official truck stop mascot.

After that, I really didn't care what the rest of the customers thought of him. He was like a 21-year-old kid in blue jeans and Nikes, eager to laugh and eager to please, but fierce in his attention to his duties. Every salt and pepper shaker was exactly in its place, not a bread crumb or coffee spill was visible when Stevie got done with the table. Our only problem was persuading him to wait to clean a table until after the customers were finished. He would hover in the background, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, scanning the dining room until a table was empty.Then he would scurry to the empty table and carefully bus dishes and glasses onto his cart and meticulously wipe the table up with a practiced flourish of his rag. If he thought a customer was watching, his brow would pucker with added concentration. He took pride in doing his job exactly right, and you had to love how hard he tried to please each and every person he met.

Over time, we learned that he lived with his mother, a widow who was disabled after repeated surgeries for cancer. They lived on their Social Security benefits in public housing two miles from the truck stop. Their social worker, who stopped to check on him every so often, admitted they had
fallen between the cracks. Money was tight, and what I paid him was probably the difference between them being able to live together and Stevie being sent to a group home. That's why the restaurant was a gloomy place that morning last August, the first morning in three years that Stevie missed work.

He was at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester getting a new valve or something put in his heart. His social worker said that people with Downs Syndrome often have heart problems at an early age so this wasn't unexpected, and there was a good chance he would come through the surgery in good shape and be back at work in a few months.

A ripple of excitement ran through the staff later that morning when word came that he was out of surgery, in recovery, and doing fine.

Frannie, the head waitress, let out a war hoop and did a little dance in the aisle when she heard the good news.

Marvin Ringers, one of our regular trucker customers, stared at the sight of this 50-year-old grandmother of four doing a victory shimmy beside his table.

Frannie blushed, smoothed her apron and shot Marvin a withering look.

He grinned. "OK, Frannie, what was that all about?" he asked.

"We just got word that Stevie is out of surgery and going to be okay."

"I was wondering where he was. I had a new joke to tell him. What was the surgery about?"

Frannie quickly told Marvin and the other two drivers sitting at his booth about Stevie's surgery, then sighed: " Yeah, I'm glad he is going to be OK," she said. "But I don't know how he and his Mom are going to handle all the bills. From what I hear, they're barely getting by as it is." Marvin nodded thoughtfully, and Frannie hurried off to wait on the rest of her tables. Since I hadn't had time to round up a busboy to replace Stevie and really didn't want to replace him, the girls were busing their own tables that day until we decided what to do.

After the morning rush, Frannie walked into my office. She had a couple of paper napkins in her hand and a funny look on her face.

"What's up?" I asked.

"I didn't get that table where Marvin and his friends were sitting cleared off after they left, and Pete and Tony were sitting there when I got back to clean it off," she said. "This was folded and tucked under a coffee cup."

She handed the napkin to me, and three $20 bills fell onto my desk when I opened it. On the outside, in big, bold letters, was printed "Something For Stevie."

"Pete asked me what that was all about," she said, "so I told him about Stevie and his Mom and everything, and Pete looked at Tony and Tony looked at Pete, and they ended up giving me this." She handed me another paper napkin that had "Something For Stevie" scrawled on its outside. Two $50 bills were tucked within its folds. Frannie looked at me with wet, shiny eyes, shook her head and said simply:
"truckers."

That was three months ago. Today is Thanksgiving, the first day Stevie is supposed to be back to work.

His placement worker said he's been counting the days until the doctor said he could work, and it didn't matter at all that it was a holiday. He called 10 times in the past week, making sure we knew he was coming, fearful that we had forgotten him or that his job was in jeopardy. I arranged to have his mother bring him to work. I then met them in the parking lot and invited them both to celebrate his day back.

Stevie was thinner and paler, but couldn't stop grinning as he pushed through the doors and headed for the back room where his apron and busing cart were waiting.

"Hold up there, Stevie, not so fast," I said. I took him and his mother by their arms. "Work can wait for a minute. To celebrate your coming back, breakfast for you and your mother is on me!" I led them toward a large corner booth at the rear of the room.

I could feel and hear the rest of the staff following behind as we marched through the dining room. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw booth after booth of grinning truckers empty and join the procession. We stopped in front of the big table. Its surface was covered with coffee cups, saucers and dinner plates, all sitting slightly crooked on dozens of folded paper napkins. "First thing you have to do, Stevie, is clean up this mess," I said. I tried to sound stern.

Stevie looked at me, and then at his mother, then pulled out one of the napkins. It had "Something for Stevie" printed on the outside. As he picked it up, two $10 bills fell onto the table.

Stevie stared at the money, then at all the napkins peeking from beneath the tableware, each with his name printed or scrawled on it. I turned to his mother. "There's more than $10,000 in cash and checks on that table, all from truckers and trucking companies that heard about your problems. "Happy Thanksgiving."

Well, it got real noisy about that time, with everybody hollering and shouting, and there were a few tears, as well.

But you know what's funny? While everybody else was busy shaking hands and hugging each other, Stevie, with a big smile on his face, was busy clearing all the cups and dishes from the table..

Best worker I ever hired.

Plant a seed and watch it grow.

At this point, you can bury this inspirational message or forward it fulfilling the need!

If you shed a tear, hug yourself, because you are a compassionate person.


- Be inspired and have a great week.

The Story of Sir John Wilson

Today’s Monday Morning Motivational Minute is excerpted from The Element, How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything by Ken Robinson.

When 12 year old John Wilson walked into chemistry class one day in October of 1931, he had no idea his life would change completely.  The experiment that day was to show how heating a container of water would cause oxygen to rise to the surface.  The experiment itself was very common but the container John was given this day was not.  A mistake by a lab assistant and a wrongly labeled bottle meant that when John heated his container, it exploded.  A portion of the classroom was destroyed, several students came away bleeding and John was left blinded in both eyes.

After two months in the hospital, as John and his parents tried to figure out how to deal with the tragedy, it became apparent that John did not view the accident as quite as catastrophic as everyone else did.  In a later interview with the London Times he said, “It didn’t strike me, even then, as a tragedy.”  He knew he had the rest of his life to live and he didn’t intend to live it in an understated way.  He went on to learn Braille, become and accomplished rower, swimmer, actor and orator as he finished high school.  After receiving his law degree form Oxford, he went to work for the National Institute for the Blind in England.

In 1946 his real calling found him while on a fact finding tour of British colonies in Africa and the Middle East.  What he discovered was rampant blindness.  However, unlike his blindness, the diseases that affected so many of the people he encountered were preventable with proper medical attention.

John went on to found Sight Savers International and over his 30 years as its director, accomplished remarkable things.  Generations of African children can thank John Wilson for their sight.  Under John’s direction, the organization preformed 3 million cataract operations and treated 12 million others at risk of becoming blind.  Between these and other preventative measures, tens of millions of people can see.

When John retired, he and his wife devoted their energy to IMPACT, a program of the World Health Organization devoted to preventing all types of disabling diseases.  Knighted in 1975, he also received the Helen Keller International Award, the Albert Schweitzer International Prize and the World Humanity Award.  He continued to be active until his death in 1999.

The story of Sir John Wilson reminds me that in Kindergarten we are all marvelously hopeful little boys and girls.  We have the world before us and we believed in the goodness of everything.  We believe in Santa Clause and the Tooth Fairy.  We believe we can be a fire truck or an astronaut when we grow up.  We believe in fairytales and princesses and that you really can turn a frog into a prince with just a kiss.  We believe in magic. To us, everything is magical.  We dream as much with our eyes open as we do while we sleep and we believe we could fly if we could just remember how we did it in our dream.  In short, we believe in everything. 

John Wilson never stopped believing.  He never lost that marvelous hopefulness. John was faced with a circumstance that would have crushed the spirit of so many other people but he insisted that he never saw his blindness as anything more than a “confounded nuisance”.  He proved dramatically that it is not what happens to us that determines our life, it is what we make of what happens to us.

So everyone, make life happen, be inspired and have a great day.