Heart Walk Inspires Change

Loch Haven park, in Orlando, saw one of the largest turn outs for a charitable event in years, Saturday. The American Heart Association’s Heart Walk had participation of over 11,000 walkers, runners, dogs, and strollers.

“It’s a good cause, the support was amazing to see. I wish it wasn’t so early or end so quickly, but overall, it was great,” said Chloe Fleece. She's a current student at the University of Central Florida student.

The American Heart Association's goal is to improve the cardiovascular health, of all Americans by 20 percent, by the year 2020. The weekend event has been inspiring people from across the nation to wake up early, in support of the cause.

“What inspired me was the fact that I am living with a heart disease,” Fleece said. “I wish I would have done this a long time ago, but recently been trying to lose weight and work on my cardio, get my heart strong.”

Different teams, such as the Team Colling: Stewart’s Army and those from Lockheed and Martin gathered donations for the day. The Florida Hospital’s Heart Walk team raised the most, out of any other corporate team, with a total of $172,000.

The donations for entire the event exceeded $1 million.

Volunteers performed life expectancy tests and measured the antioxidant levels of participants and while the vendors hung around the stage area, keeping order and collecting donations, the runners were hitting the streets of Princeton and Alden for the beginning of the race.

According to the American Heart Association website, heart diseases are the nation’s number one and number three killers, which claim more than 865,000 lives each year.

Just in case something were to happen to any one of them, there were paramedics on the scene. They were clothed in red and equipped with first aid supplies, strolling through the crowd, on bike.

The standard route was 3.1 miles, with an alternative 1 mile route, for beginners.

“The heart walk was a step in the right direction,” walker Dylan Anderson, said.

A truck with a bed full of ice and water bottles, sat parked in one of the driveways of the tree lined residential street, for walkers to grab as they passed by.

There was an accordion player on every corner, it seemed, an unexpected contribution to the background chatter of the walkers and runners.

“It’s a great way to start a Saturday morning,” Valencia student, Chris Scheidell said. “Seeing so many people doing such a great thing, it’s really motivating. It’s really inspiring.”

Student, Dylan Morley said, “Yeah, we all came out for a great cause and to get some early morning exercise. There was a lot of great energy and it was the most fun you could ever have, walking in a circle.”

Famous Poet Recites at Valencia Communtiy College

”Poetry has the power to move us from a place inside our heads, to a safer place,” Patricia Smith said Thursday, Sept. 16 while performing in the Student Lounge of the Winter Park Campus.

Smith is the author of Blood Dazzler, her fifth book and most recently published book of poetry. Last week, she stood in front of a group of more than 80 students, all eyes glued on her, as she read a few of her pieces. Some of them were straight from her book, others were recited from beneath closed eyelids.

Freshman Jillian Harris, said “If I closed my eyes, I could’ve seen the faces of the people she was reading about. It’s like she was channeling another person through her voice.”

During Smith’s performance of the poem, “34,” her voice fluctuated while she re-enacted 34 personalities that she remembers from her time in Louisiana, after hurricane Katrina hit.

She said she felt compelled to connect with these individuals, who were struggling so visibly, without food to fill their children’s bellies and no beds to rest their heads in.

”She’s really ballsy and cool,” Harris said. “She shows no fear.”

Student Dylan Morley asked Smith about how she goes about the writing process. She shared some insight into her life, as a teen, as well as what it takes to inspire her now.

Movies on television, such as Clash of the Titans, have provided beginning ideas for some of her poems. She wrote a poem about how Medusa came to be the way she is, as a direct result, of watching late-night TV.

“I record snippets of the conversations of people I encounter and I keep a small recorder under my pillow, just in case,” Smith said.

In between poems, she’d ask how the audience was doing and would shift her weight from one foot to the next, in visible anticipation.

“I judge my poems by the way the audience reacts and by the looks on their faces,” she said.

There was a question and answer part to the event, as well as time for book signing, last Thursday. She currently teaches literature and poetry at City University of New York.

Previously published in the Valencia Voice