One of my favorite weeks of the year has finally arrived – the Greater Nashville Race for the Cure returns to Brentwood this Saturday –- or Thursday if you count the related Healthy Living Expo that kicks off the weekend.

The Race will always be special to my BHP partner Kelly Gilfillan and me because it literally helped put Brentwood Home Page on the map. Two years ago – the first time the Nashville office of the Susan G. Komen for the Cure moved its biggest fundraiserof the year to Maryland Farms – BHP was just a baby. We’d only been "live" about two months. Any day we had 500 readers we considered a success.

We covered the Race like no one else, literally and figuratively. The big paper was nowhere to be found. We had pictures, stories and slideshows. Kelly, our first intern Carrie McCloud and I ate bad frozen pizza in the home office all afternoon after the last participant had crossed the finish line as we went through literally hundreds of pictures and wrote about everything we'd seen and experienced.

That first fall, the Race for the Cure and high school football helped grow our readership. As we approach the third Race in Brentwood, we’ve grown far beyond those first 500 readers. Today we send out more than 8,000 emails each morning and average almost 30,000 unique visitors each month.  But the Race continues to be one of our favorite events to write about and cover.

This year I won’t be standing at the finish line photographing and cheering on all of the breast cancer survivors as they cross the finish line, however. I’ll be in Virginia at a family wedding. But you can bet I’ll be helping to edit the survivor slideshow remotely in the hours before the “I dos” are spoken because while I won’t be there in person, my heart will be.

If you want to experience true inspiration in your life, stand at the finish line on Maryland Way and experience for yourself the celebrations of the hundreds of strong women – young, old, black, white and everything in between, big, small, daughters and grandmas – and even a few men as they cross under the huge arch of pink balloons. Bring tissues; you are going to need them.

We have stories planned throughout the week on the Expo and the race itself. We’ve already posted several that you will find in our Community section. I invite all of you to find a way to support the cause, the race and the thousands of participants and volunteers who will descend on our city Saturday morning for a crazy, fun and truly inspiring event.

I won’t be there in person, but my heart will be. I dream of the day, however, that we won’t have a need to host a Race for the Cure because there will be no need for one. Someday...

Catching up on a few things...
Last week a friend called with the best compliment. She told me that while she has lived in Brentwood for a long time, she never really felt connected to it until Brentwood Home Page started. Now, she said, she feels like she truly "lives in a small town and really belongs." Love that.

Geez, hope people for President next year
According to our friends at the Williamson Herald, early voting in Franklin is now complete, however, according to Williamson County Election Commission official Chad Gray, “Turnout was dismal compared to the last Mayor and Alderman at Large election in 2007. Just 3.5 percent of the total registered voters [42,064] have cast ballots so far.” Sounds a lot like Brentwood’s election in May. I don’t get it. I just don’t get it.

Bombs bursting in air, and in Franklin too
And finally, lots of people continue to ask if I know what that sonic boom heard around the county last Monday night was. I knew the answer – last Tuesday. Alas, it was one of those column items that never got written.

A coalition of emergency service agencies in the county and the Tennessee Highway Patrol’s Tactical/Bomb Squad detonated materials remaining from the construction of model rockets at the County Highway Department’s quarry in Franklin. Unfortunately, they didn’t bother to alert anyone in advance. 

County Emergency Management Director, Mac Purdy stated “This is an infrequent event and the materials, which were legal to own, were stable but required disposal in a controlled and safe manner.”

So that’s the rest of the story.

Susan Leathers is editor of Brentwood Home Page. Click here to read previous columns. Email her at susan@brentwoodhomepage.com