Some people walk off the war. Or commemorate a loved one. Or to release a burning they don’t understand, pain that calls for booze or wild living. Or to find a catharsis from demons we cannot see, flinging wide the backpack of their burdens so their spirit soars.

We survived the pandemic by walking to Dunkin’s. Who’d have thought? The simple promise of an iced coffee with sugar free vanilla could carry two highly challenged young men with profound autism to a new land called Purposeful Living – to unexplained happiness – to a life worth living because it honors what genuinely works for you.

Call it our 500-Mile Day Program.

I tallied mileage the other night, because I knew we were close. As of last Sunday August 2, when we summited two little mountains in the Belknap Range, Will and Jeff had walked 500 miles since March 15, 2020 when our day program announced its closure and our world changed.

(to be finished)