Run for Bun

I have always been on the other side of the table during packet pick-up for any athletic events. You pay your money, you show up and pick up your packet, pin your number on and expect that the event planners have thought of everything and expect that you can just concentrate on doing the race.

After the last few months, i have a new appreciation for how much time, energy, effort and manpower it takes to put on an event. I guess the good news is that because i helped with organizing things i didn't have to actually run.

My contributions were very minimal compared to what Megan and some of the others put into it, and this race was only a 5k. It's hard to even imagine what it takes to put on an Ironman, or a 200 mile bike race through 3 states? The Run for Bun was a little different, in the fact that it was a very short timeframe from conception to event, EVERYONE was a volunteer, and everyone in every capacity had never organized anything like this before. We did have some helpful direction from events planners at Draper City and many of the organizers had participated in events, but none had actually organized one before.

All said and done, we raised somewhere between $40-50,000 to be put towards the creation of a trail in Draper in Bunny's name. It will probably be a few years before they are able to secure enough funds to do the whole trail, but what a wonderful tribute to a wonderful person.

A few things that really struck me were the volunteers and people that came together to help. Businesses that gave of their services or goods to support this event. People that gave of their time and money.

A guy that went to school with Luke and had not seen him in 15 years and wasn't sure Luke even remembered him showed up to help at packet pick-up because he wasn't going to be around to run the 5k but wanted to do something to help.

Megan talked to the woman that was in charge of all of the registration and put countless hours helping and getting everything set up and running smoothly before, during and after the event. Megan asked her how she new Bunny. Her response was that she had never actually met Bunny. There were lots of people that had never actually met Bunny but she touched their lives anyway.

She made me as a cyclist realize how vulnerable i am. She made me as an athlete realize how powerful i am. She made me as a parent realize how precious my children are and how powerless i really am at protecting them. She made me realize as a sibling how grateful i am to have a family i can count on whenever i need them. She made me realize as a husband how much Megan means to me and how completely lost i would be without her. She made me realize as a child of God that this short mortal existence isn't all there is and at some time in the eternities, Someone has a helluva lot of explaining to do.