Endurance Magazine’s new issue is out for April. Once again, the magazine is showcasing an exceptional person in our world. April’s cover model is Mary Chervenak, who ran across the entire world in association with Blue Planet Run, to spread the following message: we can and must begin today to alleviate the catastrophic burden placed on over a billion people who, every day, must drink unsafe local water, or travel long distances on foot to search for safe water for themselves and their families. Mary ran around the world. Just to put that in context, she ran a total of 750 miles and across 16 countries with the specific intention of “transforming plight into possibility”. You can read more about her incredible journey, see more of my photographs of her – and her super cool images that she shot along the way – in the new issue!
If you get a chance, definitely peruse some of Mary’s put-you-in-her-shoes writing on her Blue Planet Run Diary. I love the quote at the top, her last diary post after finishing the run: “We’ve done the impossible and that makes us mighty.” – Malcolm Reynolds Mary writes of returning back to ‘normal life’… “You go away for a long time and return a different person ? you never come all the way back. After years of restless, semi-insomnia, I sleep ? the deep unconsciousness of childhood. After years of distraction, I focus ? the phone and e-mail are noisy, but they aren’t truly clamoring for my attention. I’m trying to live more consciously and less wastefully, to be more thoughtful and less self-absorbed, to eat more fruits and vegetables and kill fewer spiders. And so far, I’ve resisted making a list of things to do. I’m glad, glad, glad to be home, but I don’t want to come all the way back.” Going backwards, this fascinating post from her time in Russia: “Russia is big. Really big. I mean really, really big. Distressingly, ridiculously, impossibly big. We’ve been running across Russia for a week and we’ve barely made a dent in the distance we need to cover. You can take the United States, drop it into the middle of Russia, and still have room on all sides to squeeze in a few more states (the western ones). It’s big. Russia in ten-mile bites seems manageable, but it’s a slow way to cross a large country. Russia on foot, particularly at seven miles an hour, probably wouldn’t have been my first choice, but it does give you a chance to look at things: to really see where you are, consider where you’ve been, and contemplate where you’re going. I’ve been seeing, considering, and contemplating potato fields (or possibly the same potato field) for several days now. Did I mention that Russia is big?”
Oh – and then somehow towards the end of the shoot, my Sophie got a hold of a roll of Blue Planet Run stickers and decided to decorate herself. Hmmmm, not too environmentally friendly…but funny all the same 🙂
