A Tale of Hope

The gentleman you see to your left is Travis Roy.  On this day fifteen years ago, he realized his dream of playing hockey at a high level, only to see that dream dashed in eleven seconds.  The account, from the Travis Roy Foundation website:

Eleven seconds was all it took. Eleven seconds to stop cold a shining career scarcely before it had take off on the ice. Travis Roy was a promising 20-year-old hockey star. Then moments into his first collegiate game as a Boston University freshman, a freak accident drove Travis into the boards. A cracked fourth vertebra left him paralyzed from the neck down.


That account is scary enough just reading it, but to actually see the footage of that is even more cringe-inducing.  However, that accident only signaled the beginning for him, as he had to not only learn how to deal with being a quadriplegic, but also relying on others to do even a simple thing like scratching his nose.  Today, he is still in a wheelchair, but that doesn't stop him from painting pictures (using his mouth to guide the paintbrush) or giving motivational speeches.

One of a handful of greeting cards as painted by Roy

He has also written a book (with help, of course) called Eleven Seconds, which chronicles his story from the time of the accident and the road that he tread to regain some semblance of normalcy.  The Travis Roy Foundation was founded to help people that have had spinal cord injuries and to help fund research for a cure.  The money collected goes towards adaptive equipment for individuals with such injuries such as motorized wheelchairs, voice activated computers, and other things that will help.  If you would like to know more about the Foundation, go to the link here.