Learn. Dream. Live. Run. Blog?

- Originally posted on August 2, 2009 –

I tried once before to start a GOTR blog, in the fall of 2008 during our 3rd season. The girls and I just finished our lesson on cooperation and were missing Iyanna so much. Iyanna was one of the Fabulous First Founding Fifteen girls from our program at Percy Priest Elementary; she had since moved on to 5th grade at J.T. Moore Middle School. This particular day, we remembered how

responsible she’d been in the cooperation exercise where we form a circle and the girls hold their hands up like “bumpers.” One girl in the middle stands rigid, arms at her side, and falls into us as we gently push her around the circle. Iyanna had always taken extra care to make sure that no one got hurt. If the girl in the middle was falling toward one of the smaller girls, Iyanna adjusted to put her strength there. Anticipating and protecting our weaknesses, she had made our circle stronger.

As I sat down later that night, it was easy to choose a beautiful photo of Iyanna (taken by Elly Foster), but the task of bringing a reader up to speed on our program and the girls soon became overwhelming. Didn’t I need to explain Girls on the Run, tell how and why we started at Percy Priest, about all the people who’d donated time and money to make it possible? And even if I did that, I would be leaving out SO MUCH. Thing like: How Iyanna was named Impressive, Intelligent, and Illuminating Iyanna, and why? What about the rest of the girls? Bitsy, our first Sweat Queen, who swore the crown made her run faster and Zoe, our Dictionary? The question was where and how in the world to start?

So I put the blog off and placed it on the long list of things to do later.

Then this spring, another of the Fabulous First Founding Fifteen girls, Abigail, handed me an essay she wrote on how Girls on the Run helped make her more fearless. I was inspired by Abigail. She’d put her experience into words to share. I knew it was time for me to do that same. It was time for me to be fearless and take the GOTR blog off of the list of things to do later and bump it up to things to do now.

So now the GOTR Nashville Blog’s begun. You’ll find it’s hard to stop me once I start talking about the girls and women (and a Few Good Men) of GOTR…

XXOO

Jennifer

Jennifer Kimball, Girls on the Run Nashville Council Director, was reading Runner’s World one day when she saw a photo of Girls on the Run founder Molly Barker surrounded by a sea of young girls, all jumping in the air with huge grins on their faces and thought to herself, “I want to do that.” And, with the help of many other interested women (and a few good men), she did. In the fall of 2007 Girls on the Run Nashville began with 15 girls at Percy Priest Elementary and now Jennifer is the one surrounded by the happy faces of 66 girls participating in Fall 2009 programs. Jennifer always has a smile for the girls who she says both surprise, inspire her and make her laugh. Her passion, energy, care, determination and love for the girls and the program is truly contagious.