CityView Magazine

Editor’sCorner Telling the stories behind the story S ometimes it’s the story behind the story that stays with me. To be sure, this Health & Fitness issue is full of folks improving both mind and body. Writer Nathan Walls tries to keep up with doctors who run marathons, scale mountains and ski so fast it would break neighborhood speed limits. Cindy Hawkins introduces us to the new director of the Fayetteville Family Life Center, a place that mends broken spirits. And speaking of new kids on the block, I learned that the new CEO at Cape Fear Valley Medical Center is a father again, this time to an adopted daughter from Vietnam. These stories – and many others – inspired me. But I almost missed one, a story that seems appropriate to tell so close to Veterans Day. I was talking with Leona O’Berry, an administrator at Womack Army Medical Center and a passionate cyclist. We were talking about the Cross Creek Cycling Club, a group that has some bold ideas to turn our city into a friendlier place to bike. We were about to hang up when she said those magic words, “By the way …. “ O’Berry invited me to meet a group Correction Boy, do we feel dum. Some of you noticed the typographical error in our last issue. The headline in the calendar of events (“Inside Fayetteville,” Aug/Sept) should have read Drummers of the World. We offer our apologies to the organizers of this event. 10 | Oct • Nov 2008 of soldiers who work out. They’re not breaking any records nor do they want to. They arrive early, before work, in a room behind Hawley’s Bicycle World. They do it without fanfare. But each has overcome some incredible obstacles to pedal a stationary bicycle – every single one was wounded in action. I met Sgt. 1st Class Frances Montes Crawford, a medic who hurt her leg while carrying another wounded soldier to safety. Only she refused to give into the pain and served another three months to finish out her tour in Iraq. It was after she got home that doctors told her she needed surgery and lots of it. When I met her, she had already been through six different surgeries with two more to go. And then there was Staff Sgt. David Gardiner who woke up in a military hospital thinking that he would never be able to play sports again or rollerblade with his sons. Gardiner’s legs were crushed by a Bobcat. He spent an excruciating 35 minutes on the ground, under sniper fire, until help came. Doctors debated amputating both legs but saved one. Now, he wears a prosthetic, and his two sons are the ones begging for mercy on marathon bike rides. The man leading them is Capt. Ivan Castro. Castro was on a rooftop in Iraq when a mortar shell landed about five feet away. Shrapnel hit him from all directions, permanently blinding him. That was 2006. Now, he cycles with the club (thanks to a tandem bike), runs marathons with the help of sighted partners (see far left) and teaches the spinning class to his fellow wounded warriors. It was Castro who helped develop Operation Spin Cycle. He came to O’Berry, and the two of them negotiated the levels of military bureaucracy, all the way to the top, the surgeon general of the Army. Now, the program is a model for other posts, other soldiers. For men and women used to pushing their bodies, sitting still just isn’t their style. Through the pain, they persist.CV Allison Williams, Editor

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