Chicago,
Illinois to Minneapolis, Minnesota
163
Days on the Road!
Journal
Entry for:
Sunday, July 30 –
Sunday, August 6, 2000
Week
23
Total
Miles Cycled to Date: 8612 miles (13,951 km)
Community
to Community: Chicago,
Illinois to Minneapolis, Minnesota
Weather
for the Week: On
Monday, we were greeted with sheets of thunder and lightning but we said
farewell to our 23rd week with the sun shining on our backs!
Media
Successes:
**
Including 1 live interview on “Good Day Minnesota” where they sent a
helicopter to fly overhead and film Brock and Wilma on the road as they
cycled into the studio!! A fantastic interview!
Wilma’s
Reflections From the Road
*
Wilma was too busy with her new role as “Spokes” Person that she
simply didn’t have time to write her journal this week. Move over,
Brock! J
*
Brock’s
Reflections From the Road
“Last
night we woke up to four thunder and lightning storms, one right after the
other. Janine wanted to ride today but I asked her and Wilma to wait 15
miles until our breakfast break to see what was going to happen with the
weather. So I started out alone and I had to…(please don’t tell Janine
this as she thinks I repeat myself) lay my bicycle down, climb over it,
and then lift it back underneath myself!! (Maybe she’ll miss that when
she edits this – by the way, I have noticed that when she enters my
journal entries, she does take out the “mean” things I tease her
about)
I
made a wrong turn and had to cycle back a few miles – that is always
frustrating. When I finally met the campers in a little town, they had
parked in a lot next to the local gas station. The town’s welcome sign
said they were the “Friendliest Town in the U.S.” but we were soon
“encouraged” to leave the parking lot by the grumpy gas station owner.
We apologized, smiled and cycled away.
Wilma,
Janine and I stopped at a roadside veggie stand and bought 15 pieces of
sweet corn from a mom and her two little kids - 6 generations of their
family had lived on this beautiful little farm. We left with a huge bag of
corn - as if we needed the extra weight - but I’ll do anything
for food!!
By
the way, I called “Porridge for the Soul” this morning – a business
breakfast I started in Vancouver – and it was so great to connect with
the people in our community back home.
It’s also my very special mom and dad’s 60th wedding
anniversary - they are both 85 years young and they are the best!!
Janine
always brings good weather and smooth shoulders when she rides with us –
she cycled 31 miles today (I call her B&C = Ball & Chain…but
I’m only joking. She brings a great energy to our morning rides). Wilma
rode the last 70 miles of an 85 mile day that ended with lots of hills and
finished the way it started: with thunder and lightening, then a kind
grocery store owner gave us a $10 gift certificate for groceries. He said
that he would have given more, but that his business was hurting. We sure
appreciated this act of kindness…I personally believe that if we don’t
revitalize the downtown areas, then these small towns around North America
will eventually die – I’ve seen it happen over and over again.
Kindness and community are essential to me if we want to have unity, joy,
passion and purpose in our lives. (I may have said that before, but it’s
worth repeating… I hope my Editor thinks so too!!)
Kindness Toward Difficult People
“Love means to love that which is unlovable; or it is no virtue at all.”
- G.K. Chesterton
“Some acts of kindness are relatively easy – stopping to help an elderly woman fix a
tire on a day you aren’t in a hurry, for example. Others, such as volunteering your
time to a community group on a regular basis, are much more difficult. But few are
as tough as offering compassion to someone you dislike. So often we want to be nice
only to those whom we feel are worthy – the mate who brings us roses, the friend
who always has a cheery word…but what about the sour-faced person in the cubicle
next to you? Perhaps her husband has been laid off and she’s terrified about money.
Perhaps she’s been trying to get pregnant for five years and is in despair over never
having a child. By simply being alive, she is as deserving of kindness as anyone else.
We may never like the co-worker or the seemingly nosy next-door neighbor, but we
can and should act graciously toward them nonetheless. We don’t even need to know
what makes them crabby or nosy to extend our goodwill. When we offer our kindness
to even those who don’t seem “deserving” of it, we are developing our capacity to
ove impersonally, what the Greeks called agape.
True kindness is not a reward to be handed out only to those who have earned it;
rather, it is a way for us to reconnect with our own humanity. Through kindness, we
are reminded that we are all family and that even the black sheep need to be included
in the comfort and support of the fold.”
From “The Practice of Kindness”
By the Editors of the Random Acts of Kindness book series
Many
Acts of Kindness…
-
A
pizza week! We enjoyed a delicious dinner at the Pizza Hut in Madison,
Wisconsin compliments of the friendly manager, and a couple nights
later, we were treated to another pizza feast at Betty Jo’s
Restaurant in Winona, Minnesota. Thank you to both restaurants for
filling our tummies with such delicious food!
-
The
Winona Family YMCA let us use their showers and saunas after a very
muggy day in Minnesota. We sure were appreciative. Special thanks to
Lisa for her friendliness…
-
Dave,
the Produce Manager at the County Market in Winona, gave us 5 large
boxes of fresh fruits and vegetables to take with us as we left the
city. Wow!!! We enjoyed the tastiest corn on the cob, nectarines,
grapes, avocados, peaches, potatoes, yams and bananas all week. What
an amazing treat, and what an incredible act of kindness. A big
thank-you to all the folks at the County Market.
-
We
enjoyed dinner at the Scoreboard Restaurant in Minnetonka, Minnesota
compliments of the wonderful Manager, Gary. We watched football and
met our neighbours at the tables close by. A fun night out – thank
you so much, Gary.
-
Special
thanks to Hassan El Neklawy, the General Manager at the Minneapolis
Marriott SW. We were delighted by the fresh fruit baskets and cold
bottled water that you sent up to our rooms when we arrived! Thank you
for gifting us with the room nights at your beautiful property and
hats off to your staff; they treated us with such kindness all
weekend.
Kindness and Mini Golf at The Mall of America
The
Mall of America in Minneapolis, Minnesota, welcomes more visitors each
year than Disneyland, Graceland and the Grand Canyon combined. It’s a
huge mall with Camp Snoopy, Lego Land, and Underwater World beckoning you
to come and play all day long. Not only is this mall the largest in the
world, their team also has some of the biggest hearts in Minnesota. Monica
is one of those big-hearted people. She is the Public Relations
Coordinator for the Mall and she was our kindness host this weekend.
As
we pulled up to the Mall of America, we were simply in awe. It is
equivalent in size to 46 football fields! Monica met us outside and led us
to the area in front of Macy’s where we would be setting up for our
event. Everything was organized to a tee, but we expected nothing less
from Monica, whose professionalism has been evident during the months we
have been working with her. Our team bustled around and added colour to
our area with banners waving gently above the stage and Jonathan’s tour
video playing on the Sears television. Monica had four of our photos from
the road blown up and placed on easels as a gift to us - they looked
fantastic as part of our display. Our literature was ready to hand out and
our t-shirts and books were eager to jump into shopping bags and be
carried away to their new homes.
The
Mall paid for a beautiful pianist, Mary-Beth, to play at our event all
afternoon and Heather - a student intern with a heart of gold -
volunteered to help sell our merchandise. She had finished her internship
on Friday and came in on Sunday just to help us out. What a sweetie. And
as a special treat to end our event, Mary-Beth played “O! Canada” and
Monica’s best friend Eric, sang our National Anthem for all to hear
(Monica and Eric are both Canadian). He had the most incredible voice and
what a crowd he drew! We were so moved. Eric said that he was going to go
home and update his resume to include: “Sang ‘O! Canada’ at the Mall
of America for a large group of confused on-lookers”. At least he got an
enthusiastic standing ovation from the five Canadians, eh?
After
we cleaned up our area, we were treated to dinner at an amazing restaurant
in the Mall and then Monica gave us free passes to the amusement park
areas. She also gifted us with t-shirts, baseball caps and travel mugs,
which we loved. After dinner, we all rode the roller coaster (Wilma
confronted her long time fear of this snake-like ride and you should’ve
seen Brock’s face – he was so scared, he almost peed his pants). Then
we rode the misty log ride and finished our night with a hilarious game of
mini golf on Golf Mountain. I have to say that I was beating Brock…until
he distracted me and started making all these un-sportsmanlike
“choking” gestures in my direction. So I choked. And Brock won. (Until
next time, Mr. Tully…)
Monica
was just a joy to work with and she made our experience at the Mall unique
and unforgettable. Thank you Monica, for your bright spirit, enthusiastic
support and for helping us to spread kindness in Minnesota. We are so
happy that we met you.
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