The one where I walk 2,000 miles
A complicated relationship with the year 2005
Before smartphones, Fitbits, and watches that tracked every step, I slipped a forth-gen iPod, about the size of an index card, into my jacket pocket. I tucked earbuds into each ear and attached the slim white wire to the ipod’s headphone jack. Then I clipped a pedometer, only slightly larger than today’s digital watches, to my waist band. At the end of each walk, I recorded the mileage in a spreadsheet. My goal was to walk 2,800 miles in 2005.
In December 1999, my father was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a blood cancer that attacks the bone marrow, and given a five-to-seven year lifespan. As 2004 rounded out that fifth year, my dad’s treatment options were dwindling. So I decided to create a fundraiser for the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation (MMRF). This was at the height of the Susan G Komen's Race for the Cure Breast Cancer 5Ks that drew thousands of peoples to events across the United States.
I couldn’t imagine creating an organization or planning a giant event; between my three-year-old son and six-year-old daughter, my chronic anxiety and depression, and the pre-grief for my father, I could barely manage daily tasks. Most days I was so overwhelmed that I put my son in the jogging stroller and walked until he fell asleep, and then I kept walking until I was too physically drained to feel anything. On one of those walks, the fundraising idea was formed.
I called it Jensmiles: Turning Jen’s Miles into Jen Smiles. The “smile” was to raise enough money for one MMRF research grant of $100,000 (which I knew was impossible but curing terminal cancer was also impossible, so why not). But really the goal was to bring a smile to my father’s face and cement in my mind that I had literally done everything in my power to save him. The target of 2,800 miles was roughly the width of the United States; East to West. People could support the project through a direct donation to MMRF or pledge an amount per mile.
My husband, Jim, designed a logo, for Jensmiles, built a website, and turned my data into a digital dashboard with two dials: miles and money. At the center of the home page was a silhouette of a woman that walked across a map of the United States. I wrote a blog about my walking experiences and my father’s health. In the entries, I was honest, vulnerable even, but only to a point. I was always aware that the audience was mostly family and friends, in particular my parents’ friends.
I took my first step for Jensmiles on January 1, 2005, walking three miles from my grandmother’s house to my childhood home where my parents still lived. Through a light drizzly fog, I traced familiar paths of daily walks to and from school, weekends meandering on bicycles, and summers at the public pool.
After that, most walks were done in the North Texas suburb where Jim and I were raising our kids; walking to the elementary school, the church, the library, the grocery store, and along the trails that traced the peninsula of a local lake. The last walk, December 31, 2005, was a three mile path I’d never walked before—from my childhood home to the cemetery where my father was now buried.
I didn’t meet my goals. I walked 2,222 miles, just shy of 2,800 miles, and I “only” raised $19,000. The majority of the money was given “in lieu of flowers” after my father passed on May 12th. If he’d lived, I’d have probably raised less. It’s one of many upsetting beliefs that did not make it into the blog; those remained tucked away in my handwritten notebook.
In early 2006, I attempted to reconcile my public blog with my private journal into a “blook.” (Seriously, for a very brief moment, blook was a word coined in anticipation of blogs becoming printed books of the same content. In fact, it was runner up for Word of the Year in 2006.) I didn’t get very far. Reliving events and decisions of 2005 spiralled into a chaotic depression I’d never felt before. Of course, I couldn’t have realized at 31 years old (because I am only just learning at 51) that grief can’t be processed and packaged so quickly.
Every major anniversary since Dad’s passing, five years, 10, 15, I have considered writing about Jensmiles—diving into themes of fathers and daughters, religion vs faith, and public vs private grief. But each time I opened that box, the emotional overload threatened a depression relapse.
It’s been 20 years now.
The original website is long gone, but I have the blog entries stored privately. As each month of 2025 ticks by, I read a few entries and flip through the photos and documents of Jensmiles.
I have forgotten so much.
Did I really go to Washington DC to lobby Congress to give the National Institute of Health (NIH) more money for rare cancer research? I did. But only because my mother and father signed up before he died, and I took his place. Was I on the cover of a magazine? That’s right, I was. Oh, how I hated my hair that entire year. I was interviewed on the local news. I walked a half-marathon.
I struggle to believe I am descended from the young woman who did any of those things. It’s been easier to remember the messy stuff sliding around underneath all those accomplishments.
In terms of technology, the Jensmiles project is a time capsule of 2005. I smile at how Jim and I worked together to make it all happen, each separate gadget, each line of code. I marvel at how easy it would be to set up such a project today. The phone app Charity Miles was launched in 2012; open the app, pick a charity, and go for a walk—done. Social media and digital payments would take care of the rest.
But the Jensmiles time capsule holds more than tech and so much more than 365 days. Inside the box is a girl who lost her father a month after she saw him last. Inside there is a woman who found comfort in things I do not and strength in places I now avoid. It’s been 20 years—am I ready to meet her?
Am I prepared to reunite with the young woman who doesn’t know that 2006 will bring another death, a diagnosis, and a battle that will not be broadcasted. After all, if Jensmiles was just about a cool thing I did for my dad, I would have opened this box a long time ago.
Most Words & Cookies posts are open to the public, for those on or off Substack. I’m feeling like any future reflections on Jensmiles will be available only to subscribers (it’s still free but it just goes to email not publicly accessible).
Jen, this story....thank you for sharing it with us. <3