Relentless Romero Blogs

"Help me! Somebody please help me!"  I hear a struggling voice, yearning for help. I am seated in a waiting room at the eye-center at a local hospital, a teaching hospital in Denver, Colorado. "I can't see and I can't hear. Somebody please, please help me!" The voice calls out agin. There is a definite sense of urgency. Nobody is moving in the waiting room. There are 3-4 employees seated behind plexiglass watching this woman, and there are about 30 people in the waiting area. "Somebody please help me!" I stand, extend my telescoping white cane and begin tapping toward the voice. I can't see who is asking for help, but I move toward the voice. "Help me!" After about 30 feet of tapping in a straight line, I arrive at the voice. A frail grey-hared 70+ year old African-American woman in a wheelchair is anxiously begging for help. She continues to urgently say, "I need help! Somebody please help me!" She has a device she is speak...

Do you hear a voice? Is there thunder and lightning? A burning bush? Something dramatic like in the movies? Or, a whisper? I don’t think everybody’s experience is the same. The following is the experience I had, when I was at my rock bottom and I believe I was Called by God.   I was middle-aged; 44 to be exact. Had only been a Believer for a few years and a true neophyte in my Faith journey. I was a regular church-goer and had participated in a mission trip to Central Mexico. Other things were taking place in my life which made this a less than optimal time to have an encounter with the Almighty One. I have a degenerative eye condition, and it had deteriorated to a point where I had to make the difficult decision to stop driving. Actually, the decision was made for me as I almost had an accident with some pedestrians, and I couldn’t be sure whether it was as a result of my deteriorated eyesight. I felt a duty to assume my lack of eyesight was the culprit of the “almost accident”, a...

  You should write a book! How many times have you uttered or heard these words? It is estimated that less than one-percent of the population will endeavor to publish a book; and of the people who actually start writing a manuscript, only 3% will actually publish their work. I'm not a writer. I'm blind. I don't know how to publish a book. Nobody is going to care about my book, let alone pay good money to buy it. Despite the self-deprecating thoughts I have, I've been fortunate and crazy enough to successfully publish a book ( Running into the Dark ) four years ago. It was a 400-page memoir that included the detailed story of my 3,063 mile run across the US. I was warned by authors and publishing houses to not write a memoir. "Readers only care about memoirs of the President, celebrities and famous people," they would say. Despite being warned, I wrote night and day for 9 months until the manuscript was complete. Then, I found a few editors, an assisted self pu...

  My friend and trusted guide, Camilo, was just steps ahead of me climbing up a steep pitch on a mountain in Southwestern Colorado. We had been moving on foot for more than 80 miles and almost 30-hours, climbing and descending mountains, crossing creeks, post-holing through snow banks and sloshing in muddied single-track that tried to suck the shoes right off our feet. We heard a voice. You made it?! Where's your buddy? Camilo responded, "He's right here." As we breached a wooded area the trail opened up to the voice, and before us stood the Mace's Hideout 100 Race Director. He seemed surprised to see us. As we passed him, he thanked me for coming to the race and participating in the event. He pointed us to the trail which continued climbing up what seemed like a never ending mountain. We continued upward and onward. You'll never make the next aid station before the cut-off! I was startled by these words which erupted from behind me. After processing the state...

  THE GOAL - So this year I turned 50, and a lot of things happened - some good, some bad - like you can always expect from life. I wanted to do something for me during this year of life - I had thought about some independent long distance adventures to really get "out there" and push myself. This year of life did not permit that for me. I settled on trying to better my 100 mile run time, and establish a new world record for my blind/visually impaired peeps to chase.  I ran three 100 mile races and failed to better my 100 Mile Road run time of 18 hour 49 minutes. Earlier this year I learned about an American visually impaired runner who is fast and is probably going to take sown several utlta-distance running records - Benjamin Simanski. He is strong, in his late-30s and only getting better. I also learned of 30-something year old visually impaired Irish-Beast, Sinead Kane. She recently sued the International Association of Ultrarunning and won - her beef was that she qualifi...