Chapter 12: We Made It!

Finally, after three long, hot, painful days, we made it to the Dallas Convention Center. We turned the last block, and the streets were lined with people, cheering and clapping and crying along the edge of the sidewalk. At the entrance to the convention center was a huge mass of people, and a bunch of fold-up chairs.

Apparently people had been walking from the hundred-degree heat into the forty-degree air conditioning of the building, and passing out cold; so they had each of us chug a bottle of water before we were allowed inside.

I stepped through the doors, and I didn't see the hundreds of people that I was expecting; but then I was pointed towards an escalator, and I went up to the top floor. that's where everyone was.

There was a long line of people, clapping and cheering for us as we walked in. We had done it! One of the crew guided us towards tables where we picked up our (long-sleeved!) victory shirts.

After a few minutes of wandering around, I figured out where the bathrooms were. I went in, and there was a short line of about five people. It was the first time in days we flushed toilets and washed our hands with running water. It felt weird. It was in that bathroom that I came to the realization that all us hobbling walkers looked like the monsters from the "Thriller" video.

Back in the main room, one of the crew members stood up on a table. She was hilarioius and had kept us laughing on the whole walk. She said "Family members and friends, we really love you, but GET OUT." Everyone giggled, but they got the point. Fathers, mothers, little children, and all kinds of people in-between that looked healthy and uninjured walked out of the room and out of the convention center. We were told that if we wanted to stand next to someone in the closing ceremonies, to stand behind them, because we were going to be filed out there in lines. Suddenly, there right beside me was that girl--the one from the very first day, the opening ceremonies, with the blue baseball cap and her mother's picture pinned to it. (At least I assumed it was her mother's picture...)

So there's that lady, walking right in front of me, and the Canadian lady was walking behind me. The one with the sprained ankle had found her sister, and we hadn't seen her since. There were thousands and thousands and thousands of people lining the street. I was stunned by how many people were there, cheering for us. I knew that my Scott and the kidlets weren't there, though; they had just gotten into Plano, and they were dropping stuff from the long drive off at home before coming to pick me up.

I had forgotten about the shoe thing until I saw people doing it at the stage. They were playing this great, upbeat celtic music (think running through the mountains in that movie Braveheart), and people were taking off one or even in some cases both sneakers and waving them in the air. I didn't take my sneakers off. In fact, I was afraid to, for fear that my toes would fall off, or worse yet, I would never get my shoes back on.

It was hot--really hot. The people running the show got up on stage and did their little speeches, and I was just about out of water. Then, suddenly like a miracle, a gallon jug of water started circling around the walkers, and I got an inch of water in my bottle before passing it on. I really needed that.

Someone behind me said, "Hey, look up there!" and pointed at the glass of the convention center. It took my breath away. It gave you just a tiny grasp of how many thousands of people were there.

After the closing ceremonies were over, we all kind of wandered around for a moment. No one knew where our luggage was. I began to follow a stream of people around to the other side of the building, and I saw giant letter-signs marking off our luggage. I found my giant green military bag and just sat on it. Scott called my cell phone, and eventually he found where I was. I saw him pull up, and I got up off the bag and started walking towards the van, a few hundred yards away.

Scott got out of the van, and he walked around to the sliding side door, letting the kids out. I began to well up. I hadn't seen them in two weeks. Very slowly, very painfully, I got down on my knees on the edge of the sidewalk, stretched out my arms to them, and started bawling my eyes out. They ran to me, just like in a movie, and held me tight. I stood up, ever so slowly, and handed one kid my water bottle and one kid my phone. Scott had gone to get the bag and bring it to the van. I walked, holding my kids around the shoulders, giving them squeezes and still crying. "You did good, you made it," I heard a man off to the side say. I just smiled; I couldn't see much through the tears. We got to the van, and I helped the kids in and shut their door, then got into the passenger's side. I was so, so happy that I can't even describe it to you.

Dylan was apparently pretty konked out, and he fell asleep just a few minutes into the drive home.

So that's it! I hope you enjoyed this walk story; maybe one day you'll even take part in a walk yourself.