VLA-November 6, 2001

Arriving at the VLA at sunset was an amazing sight. The line of satellite dishes stretched across the desert like a string of enormous pearls. By ten o'clock, several of the runners had wandered in, and we started scratching our heads over the night's schedule. There weren't enough runners, and we decided to each run extra legs. A few hours later I was off and running with organizer Mike Burr and a couple of others on the midnight-to-one-o'clock shift, with the command vehicle trailing at a watchful distance, piping "You've Lost that Lovin' Feeling" from the truck's megaphone. Shortly after one o'clock we turned the flag to the next crew, but couldn't decide if it was the end of a long night, or beginning of another long day. So after a split vote we ended up with both beer and doughnuts.

I slept for a couple of hours, waking at about four in the morning. I wasn't supposed to run again until 6:30, but I wanted to make sure there were enough runners, so shaking the cobwebs from my head I set out for the starting point at the visitor's center. The parking lot was black and empty, but on the road two lone runners carried the American and New Mexico state flags up and down the road, their whispered words barely audible over the desert's night sounds. We couldn't cross the Continental Divide at night, so the runners volunteered to keep the flag moving at the VLA until morning when fresh runners would arrive. Suddenly my mood changed from a fun-loving, "isn't-this-a-goofy-thing-to-do-in-the-middle-of-the-night" to a deep respect for all the runners who kept the flag moving these long days and nights. What would happen if they parked the flag and started fresh from the VLA the next morning? Nothing. But that wasn't the point; it was to run the flag continuously from Boston to L.A., symbolically completing the flights of the American and United Airlines flights that did not make it on September 11th. And so these runners, barely shadows under the watchful eye of the distant satellite dishes, kept the promise, and the flags, along with the spirits of those we lost that day, continued.

Click on the Links Below to Visit Our Sponsors Registered Event Promoters