Jonathan Reid, Franklin Central High School – Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology
We are pleased to introduce our 2023 Erika Wells Memorial Scholarship winners, who each received a $1000 scholarship towards their college education. Please enjoy reading their personal essays, in which they discuss how running has made a positive impact on their lives.
Erika Wells was a beloved member of the Indy Runners who tragically passed away in October 2016. Her dedication to service, personal growth, social engagement, and an overall use of running as part of a healthy lifestyle and a way to help support the community were unparalleled. We believe these winners each exemplify these characteristics as well.
We are thankful that these young people were willing to share their unique stories of how running has influenced their lives. We hope that they will continue to make running a cornerstone of their life.
“Running, although now a major part of my life, initially was something that I largely disliked. I ran around and played tag with my friends in the backyard, but I never would’ve considered running if it wasn’t for my father forcing me to run cross country in 6th grade.
I initially hated every part of it. Every long summer practice, every lap around the school, every single day where I wasn’t able to go home like every other kid and have time to play outside. However, as awful as I perceived it to be, it only took a season to fully understand why my dad forced me to run and how much I would begin to love running.
My dad wanted me to have an emotional and mental outlet to sort myself out whenever I got angry or overworked. I never realized just how valuable this would be until high school, where the immense workload from AP classes, extracurriculars, and maintaining a top 25 spot in my class of 700 people would’ve mentally destroyed me if I didn’t have a cross country to act as my stress reliever. My parents especially knew me as the kid that won’t stop trying his best no matter what consequences may arrive from the intense perseverance, so instead of trying to stipend my work ethic, they gave me the gift of teaching me how to healthily deal with stress while also enjoying myself. No matter the distance, cadence, or speed, running is a sport that solely relies on pushing yourself to your absolute best to push new boundaries and break your own goals and records you set for yourself, so I naturally came to love running as its own activity while it also let me enjoy the rest of my life better due to the decreased stress.
The other main reason my dad forced me to run was because of what it meant to my family. ‘The Running Reids’ was an established running group that ran in multiple areas around central Illinois and held many charity events in the form of races as a part of that. Even to this day, my cousin (a fellow John Reid, ironically) still runs a 5k event in the summer every year.
However, my ‘Running Reid’ that made me love running more than anything was my grandfather. A paratrooper in Vietnam, he was stranded from his squad and blasted by a grenade so he had to return home early. Before his now crippling Parkinson’s disease (from the grenade) fully set in, he dedicated his life to his family and running. Despite constantly fighting against the scars of his past, he’s managed to run 20 marathons, including 3 Boston marathons, in his 26 year running career.
Running was his personal fight against the wickedness of the world; it’s mine too.
Put plainly, I love running because of what it does to people and what it forces them to become: healthier and happier than they were the day before.”
