In A Boston Marathon Journey, Jackie Kellner uses her detailed running logs and personal stories to demonstrate how she, an ordinary woman, creates an extraordinary life, using the simple and natural act of running.
The readers’ double-take is that she still does this at 70+ years young.
As a book about running, it includes a multitude of tips, encouragement, and ideas for those who want to start running, return to it, or step up from a casual approach to a more challenging and highly rewarding commitment. As a book about life, the author shares much of herself, her ups and downs and turns in the path, making her story relatable and inspiring.
“Writing a book has been a dream of mine since the sixth grade, but I never knew what to write about, until now. Desire combined with purpose, finally, as I endeavored to make sense of how I came to qualify for and run the Boston Marathon at the age of 67,” said Kellner.
The book has strong endorsements from experts such as Denise Piercy, co-owner of the Running Zone store in Melbourne, Florida, and cofounder of the Running Zone Foundation, Inc., a non-profit established to promote fitness and benefit local charities. “Many of us do not imagine ourselves being able to do big things in our lives, and yet somehow we do manage to achieve them,” said Piercy, who sees the author as an inspiration to others, especially those who can’t imagine themselves running in road races after age 50, 60, and beyond.
The book has been out a while, now, and I asked Jackie about her experiences since its publication. “There have been many surprises,” she said. “Yes, I like seeing my Amazon sales, but what I love is hearing from people who may have known me for many years and now they’ve read my book and feel compelled to call me. I was very open and vulnerable in writing this memoir, and I don’t regret it. Everyone has been very positive.”
Jackie, wife, mother, and grandmother of nine, is a resident of Melbourne, Florida, where she enjoys a lifestyle she says is even more active and rewarding than before retirement. When she is not running and winning medals in marathons or shorter races, she is volunteering at the race events, or for any number of worthy causes her local Space Coast Parrothead club turns out to support.
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