At Wallace Marine Park in West Salem, over 100 people gather to do something. Some show up to walk with their families and friends. Other arrive to ride their bikes through the clear and light air of a mid-summer’s evening. Others decide they want to define intensity and try Spartan in the Park. Still, others devote their Friday evening to chasing a man dressed as a rabbit through the woods and over the river and back again.

Our idea was simple: give Courthouse members a chance to do something with their fitness. We thought let’s create an event that would allow everyone an opportunity to move, to be active, to be with friends, to accomplish something they may have never done before. We called it The Event.

Drew Baker, who led Spartan in the Park, said that at one point he could see bikes pass walkers, runners fly past others doing Spartan; he said he wished more people could have seen what he saw, that more people could have experienced what folks at The Event were experiencing.

Scott Bushey, General Manager at Keizer, said he saw something very special in those who did. “I felt a sense of accomplishment. It’s not always easy to feel that when exercising. I could see and feel that everyone at the The Event felt that same sense of accomplishment. We all had fun and helped remind everyone why we choose to exercise and stay fit.”

The idea is simple: let’s do stuff because doing stuff is fun. The Event had only four possible things to do. But out there, where you are going, where you are looking out towards, outside your front door and just beyond your living room, there are more possibilities than you could even count or imagine.

Just before the Big Prize Treasure Hunt, everyone was asked if this was the first time doing what they had done. Many raised their hands. Many felt that sense of accomplishment. Many will now go on and continue to find joy in movement and will see the world and themselves with a little more pride and a stronger sense of adventure.