Let’s Move, Let’s Run

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From Your Health Journal…..”You have to read a letter from David Willey I found on the Huffington Post. I have provided the link below for my readers to view the complete article/letter. What a nice gesture, and I like how Mr. Willey complimented Mrs. Obama for her work on the Let’s Move initiative. So many children in the United States are considered obese or overweight, and her initiative has helped reduce obesity in some major cities. Please visit the Huff Post site to read the complete article/letter.”

From the article…..

Dear Mr. President and Mrs. Obama,

Thank you again for having me at the White House Christmas party in December. I’m sure you don’t remember me, since I was among the 600 people you met that night. I accompanied a colleague who was on the invite list, Prevention editorial director Anne Alexander, and when we were asked if we’d like to pose for a photo with you, I began writing an elevator speech in my head. There were many things I wanted to say and ask, but I edited them down to two.

But after being spellbound by the high school choir singing “Hallelujah” near the Southeast Entrance and a Marine Corps quartet playing Pachelbel’s Canon on the first floor of the residence, then having cocktails and dinner in the State Dining Room, then checking out the dazzling 19-foot Christmas tree in the Blue Room (killer views of the Washington Monument from every window), and making our way through the Map Room (FDR and Churchill sat right there during World War II) into the Diplomatic Reception Room for our moment in front of the flashbulbs… Well, my elevator speech went by the wayside. I managed to thank you for hosting us, noted silently how tall you both are, and realized nothing I said would’ve stuck in the six seconds we were together. Had we somehow spent a few minutes talking without the impeccably polite military attachés shuffling everyone along, here’s what I would’ve said:

Mrs. Obama, you deserve a lot of credit. After decades of rising childhood obesity rates, several American cities are seeing their first declines. I suspect Let’s Move! — the initiative you launched from the White House in 2010 to help kids and families eat better and exercise more — has a lot to do with that. But from the beginning, I wondered why running wasn’t part of Let’s Move!, and I think now is the time to officially embrace it.

To read the full article…..Click here