Halls focus on what's really important
Published: Tuesday, February 7, 2012 at 7:48 p.m.
Last Modified: Tuesday, February 7, 2012 at 7:48 p.m.
It was instinct on her part, pure instinct. Sara Hall (nee Bei) was too young to otherwise lay it all out for her parents, the reasoning, the compassion, the logic and, especially, the need. No, life for a six-year old doesn't get that complicated and this was very uncomplicated. Some things had to be done, you see. So when her mother, Karen, would make the announcement, mom would know immediately what was coming next.
"We're going to San Francisco to spend the day," Karen would say in their Santa Rosa home.
"So let's pack some lunch bags," Sara would say.
Not for the Beis. For the homeless in San Francisco. The Beis would stop on the streets in the city, hand out the food, and be on their way. No big deal. Just part of being a human being, Sara thought. Now, more than 20 years later, that desire to serve humanity is stronger now than it was then. It, however, certainly had plenty of opportunity to dissipate if not disappear from memory altogether.
Hall was the first person to win four state cross country titles in California. At Montgomery High, Hall was a three-time state champion in the mile and two-mile. A three-time high school All-American Hall went on to Stanford, was a seven-time college All-American. Now 28, Hall will attempt later this spring to make the U.S. Olympic Track and Field team in the steeplechase.
Married for six years to Ryan Hall — who recently qualified for the 2012 U.S. Olympic team as a marathoner — Hall has had plenty of chances to be self-involved, for that's the temptation all elite athletes face.
“But God made my heart tender,”
said Hall, owner of a Stanford degree in human biology, now living in Redding.
That tender heart who gave away lunch bags to San Francisco's homeless never had a chance to harden as an adult. Her travels prevented that. Among others, Hall has been to all of western Europe, Russia, Qatar, Mexico, Japan, Zanzibar and Zambia. A trip with her husband to Tanzania particularly stood out.
“We went to some of their homes,” Hall said, “and one wall of a home was just a mattress. It wasn't even a house.”
Sara and Ryan established the Hall Steps Foundation, a charity to help the underserved communities, primarily in Africa and American inner cities. On January 21st at Slater Middle School the couple held an auction in which the proceeds went to the Foundation. More than $6,000 was raised, an amount that provided enough impetus for the pair to consider making it an annual event in Hall's hometown.
Yes, she will be the first to admit, seeing television images after television images of destitute people in Africa, all of them wrapped around pleas for donations, eyes can glass over, sentiment can chill, good intentions can dry up.
“It can be overwhelming,” Hall admitted. “It can be easy to be apathetic and distance yourself. But once you see the conditions you can't go back to your life. It's not just about you. And the thing that struck me was the people. Even in those living conditions they were so open, so warm.”
Running, whether it's short distances or the longer ones, has typically been viewed as a labor of love, with suffering a necessary component. But Ryan views running from another perspective, one not commonly held.
“Running puts you in touch with humanity,” Ryan said. “It makes me feel grounded.”
For him, the memory that pops up most readily, the one that has created the most impact, was Ryan Hall having a fun run across the border in Tijuana.
“Kids were out there with holes in their shorts,” he said. “They had been playing soccer with balls made of plastic bags filled with pine needles. It was a 9K race for all ages and there were kids running in plastic farming boots. One kid was running on asphalt with no shoes. It was 90 degrees outside. Every so often he would stop and pour water on his feet to cool them down.”
Those images have been seared into Hall's memory.
Here is one other one:
“They seemed so happy,” he said, knowing that sentence is a contradiction to what he just described. And that contradiction fuels their energy as much as anything else. For if someone can run a 9K barefoot with a smile on his face, that says something about the human spirit, about the power of a single thought, the desire to thrive, despite the circumstances.
“Poverty pulls at your heart,” Ryan Hall said. “There's so much of it but I like to look at it this way: I have calculated it takes me a half million steps to train properly for a marathon in a six-month period. So it's one step at a time, for the marathon, to fight poverty. Put your head down and keep chipping away.”
Put your head down and keep chipping away but don't forget to look up.
On a recent run through Annadel State Park, Ryan Hall was spotted by a runner, most likely local and obviously familiar Ryan and Sara Hall.
“Hey, Mr. Bei! How you doing?”
Ryan Hall smiled. Training for the Olympics is serious business. So is fighting poverty. On the other hand, if a kid running without shoes on asphalt can smile, why can't he? The impoverished, Ryan and Sara will say, can teach us as much as we can teach them.
For more North Bay sports go to Bob Padecky's blog at padecky.blogs.pressdemocrat.com. You can reach Staff Columnist Bob Padecky at 521-5223 or bob.padecky@pressdemocrat.com.
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