Chapter 1: In the Beginning

27 June 1983 – West Ware Road, Enfield, Massachusetts

Jeff Knox opened an eye to look at his alarm clock, which he hadn’t set the night before. His sleep-fogged brain registered the bright sunlight streaming around his shade and curtains as he did so.

“8:45,” the bright red numbers read.

Jeff sighed and burrowed back into his pillow. He allowed himself to wake up more before rolling out of bed, dropping to the floor, and beginning his morning workout routine.

Three months ago, not long after baseball season started, Jeff began doing as many push-ups and sit-ups as his body would allow. He could now do nearly fifty quick repetitions of each before his muscles began to fatigue, and he began to see definition in them. Today, he planned to add a more visible piece to his exercise routine.

He hadn’t told anyone at his former school what he’d begun to do, nor about how he wanted to change the direction of his life. Since the fourth grade, those in his class have considered him a geek. At first, that was due to his slightly awkward social interactions with his classmates.

That label stuck due to his increasing academic successes as the years went by. While he was friendly with people at the public middle school, there wasn’t anyone to whom he would apply the label of ’friend’. Starting a new school in the fall would offer him a new chance at making friends. Getting dressed, Jeff visited the bathroom before going downstairs to the kitchen.

“Morning, Mom,” he said as he entered.

“Hey, Jeff!” Marisa Knox replied from the breakfast nook, smiling at her oldest.

She loved sitting by the windows overlooking their expansive backyard, taking in the scene regardless of the weather or time of year. Great Quabbin Hill dominated that view. She shuddered when she remembered how the towns in this picturesque valley were nearly destroyed to satisfy Boston’s growing thirst for water.

“What do you have planned for your first weekday of vacation?” she asked.

Jeff got himself a glass of OJ and a bowl of cereal. In contrast to the region’s public schools, which let out for the summer on Friday the twenty-fourth, private Thompkins School, where Marisa taught sixth-grade math, let out about a week and a half earlier.

“I’m going to bike to the Village and talk to someone at Quabbin Runners about running shoes and how to get started with a running program. I saw a help wanted sign in the window of Bilzarian’s Hardware, so I thought I’d stop in and check that out while I’m nearby.”

Marisa raised an eyebrow.

“Not giving yourself any time off, are you?”

“I know it looks that way, Mom,” Jeff sighed, “but I’ll be doing my workouts in the morning. That will give me plenty of time during the rest of the day to do stuff unless I wind up with a job at Bilzarian’s. I’ll also try out for the soccer team when I get to Thompkins.

“They’ve routinely got some of the best sports teams in the state, so I’ve got to be able to hang with the others if I want a chance to play. I’ll also need the extra stamina when hockey and baseball roll around.”

“Honey,” Marisa said in an understanding voice, “I just want you to enjoy your summer. That’s all.”

“I will, Mom,” Jeff assured her. “Going to Thompkins this fall will give me a new chance to make a first impression. I want to make a good one.”

Marisa smiled at her son. She had seen his frustration over the last few years, as he seemed unable to overcome the ‘geek’ label he had been given. She prayed that Thompkins would be as good for him as he had hoped.

“Are you going to be running on these roads?” she asked.

“No, thanks,” Jeff mumbled around a mouthful of cereal. “At least not until I get more used to running. The roads around here are too narrow for my taste, even though I’ve ridden my bike on them for years. I’ll ride over to Thompkins and run on their track while I’m getting started, as long as it’s not a problem.”

”’Problem?’” Marisa snorted. “You’ve been in and out of that school your entire life! Almost the entire staff knows you!”

Jeff was going to be a faculty kid at Thompkins, where his mother taught, something he wasn’t sure he’d like. While Marisa and her husband Joe had discussed keeping their kids in the public school system until they left for college, it was obvious that Jeff and his younger sister Kara wouldn’t be challenged enough unless they went to a school with academics as rigorous as Thompkins. He rinsed his cereal bowl and glass and put them in the dishwasher.

“The sink? Is that where they go?”

“No, Mom.”

He filled the water bottle for his bike and set out for Enfield town center. The bike ride from southeastern Enfield - known to residents as Enfield Plains - to Enfield Village, as the center was called, was about two and a half miles. People waved as he passed them, including people in their cars.

He enjoyed this about the valley: everybody knew everybody, so he tried hard not to be a dirtbag. He’d be starting high school in the fall so he only had four more years to enjoy it. Even if he went to UMass, just a few towns to the west, he’d still be away from the valley he’d called home his whole life.

Never a very populous region, census estimates put the Swift River Valley town population at about twelve thousand people. Zoning laws enacted after Boston’s attempted land grab were strict. No malls, strip or otherwise, are allowed in the four valley towns - Dana, Greenwich, Prescott, and Enfield.

Neither were they allowed in four others nearby that also wanted to preserve their rural character - Petersham, New Salem, Shutesbury, and his mother’s hometown of Pelham.

Two other towns, Ware and Belchertown, solicited the Commonwealth years ago to improve Route 9 through their municipalities, and strip malls abounded.

The valley towns still strongly distrusted state involvement in their region. However, not all interactions between the State House and the region’s communities were terrible. Boston was still quite solicitous of requests from the area, thanks to constant reminders of what the state and its Metropolitan District Commission - the water rights agency for Metro Boston - tried to do.

One such example was that the Commonwealth approved requests to give more police-like authority to the sheriff departments of the areas to augment local departments. These departments were almost a regional police force in themselves. The sheriff’s departments mainly ran the jails in Massachusetts.

Entering the Enfield Village district required Jeff to pay more attention to his riding. Traffic, such as traffic can be in the valley, was heavier in the town center. Jeff turned north on Main, following Routes 21 and 34, where East Street joined Main Street.

The road followed the general route of the old Boston and Albany Railroad Athol branch line. It was now being re-purposed as the B&A Bike Trail. Once in the center proper, Jeff waved to the firefighters, many of whom had kids he went to school with, working outside their station across Main Street. Honestly, Jeff was more friendly with the firefighters than most of their kids.

He parked his bike before the Quabbin Runners storefront and locked it to a streetlamp post. When he entered the former car dealership, Jeff recognized Mr. O’Mara, his gym teacher at Enfield Middle School, talking to another man.

While the store’s name said ‘runners,’ Jeff noticed a wide selection of equipment for all the sports played in the area. Family stores abounded in the valley, while large chain stores were absent. Mr. O’Mara noticed Jeff approaching the dizzying display of running shoes on the store’s back wall.

“Well, now!” the older gentleman boomed. “‘Tis a good thing to see such a friendly face!” Sean O’Mara held out his meaty hand and shook with Jeff.

“Hi, Mr. O’Mara. How was the first weekend of your summer?”

“Boyo, I’ve retired from teaching,” the man admitted, drawing a look of shock from Jeff.

”’Retired?’”

“‘Tis true, I’m sorry ta say. I dinna want a lot of fanfare when I finally decided ta go. I told Mr. Davies beforehand but turned in my papers this morning.”

Mr. Davies was the middle school’s principal.

“Well, I feel sorry for the kids coming up behind me,” Jeff said sadly. “Your gym class was one of my fun classes at Enfield Middle. What are you going to be doing now?”

“If he makes it through training, he’ll be my newest salesman!” the younger man joked.

“Jeff, the man pretending to be a comedian over here is my oldest son, Tim. Tim, this fine young lad is Jeff Knox. He’ll be going to Thompkins next year. His ma teaches math there.”

Jeff shook hands with the younger O’Mara.

“Good to meet you, Jeff. Besides the opportunity to trade tall tales with this grumpy old Gus here, what brings you into my store today?” Tim asked.

“I’d like to start running, Mr. O’Mara, but I don’t know what kind of shoe is the best, how much they cost, or how to get started with a program.”

“Then you’ve come to the right place, Jeff! The question isn’t really what shoe is best, but what shoe is best for you?”

“That makes sense.”

“Come over here so I can watch your feet as you run and figure out the right answer to that question. What do you want to train for?”