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"It was a year ago today that 23,342 people ran the 117th Boston Marathon. Ethopia&amp;#x27;s Lelisa Desisa won the men&amp;#x27;s race, and Kenya&amp;#x27;s Rita Jeptoo won the women&amp;#x27;s race, but nobody remembers that. What we do remember is the dark cloud of smoke pluming over Boylston Street as the everyday runners&amp;amp;mdash;the coworker running to raise money for charity, the friend who trained all through the winter to finish her first race&amp;amp;mdash;ran down the last stretch. Their friends and family were the ones standing outside Marathon Sports, a running store that happens to be right near the finish line, as the first bomb went off by their feet. Then, several blocks away, another cloud of smoke. Marathon Sports on Boylston Street in Boston, after it reopened. I don&amp;#x27;t need to describe the scene for you. We all saw the photos. We all know it was awful. On a personal level, I saw where the smoke was coming from and felt panicked. Ten years ago as a student at Boston University, Marathon Sports was my second home within the city. I had worked there, specifically at the Boylston Street store (there are several throughout the city, and more in the Boston suburbs), up until I graduated. I knew the stretch of sidewalk in front of the store well&amp;amp;mdash;it was where I had watched probably hundreds of runners as they tried on sneakers, looking closely to see if their ankles wobbled in, or wobbled out. Like the rest of you, I would later learn that three spectators at the scene of the bombing were killed, including Krystle Marie Campbell, 29; Lu Lingzi, 23; and Martin William Richard, 8. Another 264 people were treated for injuries (like Rebekah Gregory and Pete DiMartino), 16 of which required amputations. I would also learn that Shane O&amp;#x27;Hara, the store manager, who had been my boss a decade ago, and the Marathon Sports staff working that day (all of whom were thankfully unhurt) helped those numbers from perhaps being even higher. Dan Soleau, the store&amp;#x27;s brand marketing manager, recalled how employees grabbed clothes off the racks, using them as tourniquets on victims to stop the bleeding and rushed to get them water. He later described the scene to CBS as &amp;quot;the worst thing I have ever seen.&amp;quot; Left: After the bombings, a T-shirt was laid out in memory of victims in front of Marathon Sports. Right: Shane O&amp;#x27;Hara hugs former Red Sox player Jarrod Saltalamacchia at the site of the Boston Marathon finish line on Nov. 2. I wasn&amp;#x27;t surprised to hear how the staff members had jumped in to help. I also wasn&amp;#x27;t surprised that in the months after the bombings, Marathon Sports became, and continues to be, a central part of Boston&amp;#x27;s recovery. There&amp;#x27;s something about the culture of the store that has always invited people to come in and let their guards down&amp;amp;mdash;I can recall customers talking to me about everything from their plantar fasciitis to recent breakups. (Training for a marathon, as it turns out, can be a great way to get over What&amp;#x27;s-His-Face.) And it wasn&amp;#x27;t just the customers who benefitted from the niceness of the place. I was 19 when I first walked into Marathon Sports, where I nervously asked if they were accepting applicants. I had moved to Boston after transferring schools in the middle of my freshman year, and not only was I having a hard time making friends at a big university, but I could barely afford tuition and all the expenses that come with it. I was shy and lonely and out of place. I needed a job, but I also needed a home base in a strange city. Marathon Sports gave me both. I&amp;#x27;m far from the only former employee to feel this way. Pete Schultz, now a Weekend Update writer for SNL, also worked at Marathon Sports at the time I did. &amp;quot;It was supposed to be a very temporary thing,&amp;quot; says Pete, who was a graduate student in need of rent money while he studied film. But when he didn&amp;#x27;t land a screenwriting gig right after graduation, he stayed on for what ended up being three years. &amp;quot;It seems like it should have been depressing to have two degrees and be just a few steps above Al Bundy, but it never really was,&amp;quot; says Pete. &amp;quot;I don&amp;#x27;t think there was anyone there I didn&amp;#x27;t like or find interesting.&amp;quot; Even after he left for New York City, Pete would come back for the Boston Marathon, working the two-day runner&amp;#x27;s expo with the Marathon Sports team and partying with the staff. &amp;quot;I think I did eight or nine straight years at the expo and not because I love when people haggle over the price of shoes, but because I missed my friends,&amp;quot; he says. Like so many people who know the Marathon Sports crew, Pete took to Twitter to check if everyone was OK after the blast. &amp;quot;I turned on the TV and immediately recognized the spot where the bomb had gone off, and my stomach knotted up,&amp;quot; he says. &amp;quot;I knew some of my [former colleagues and] friends would be there.&amp;quot; But then, when he heard how the staff instantly jumped in to help victims, he also wasn&amp;#x27;t shocked. &amp;quot;That&amp;#x27;s just the kind of amazing people I remember working with.&amp;quot; Left: Customers try on sneakers at Marathon Sports on April 13. Right: A woman browses &amp;quot;Boston Strong&amp;quot; shirts and official Boston Marathon gear at the store. It might sound a little weird that a college job could stay with you in such a way, but that was the thing about Marathon Sports: For running geeks everywhere (myself included), the store was and is a welcomed throwback to a day when you walk in a place&amp;amp;mdash;even in a big city&amp;amp;mdash;and the people who work there know your name. And maybe that&amp;#x27;s why on a recent trip to Boston, I didn&amp;#x27;t stop by my alma mater...at least not the one that gave me a degree. But I did stop by Marathon Sports to say hi to Shane. I wanted to tell him I knew what had happened there, what he had done, and that I was proud to know him. I guess that&amp;#x27;s the thing though&amp;amp;mdash;he&amp;#x27;s been having that conversation, reliving the bad moments, for a year. I knew right after shaking his hand that I couldn&amp;#x27;t ask him to do it again. So instead we talked about how Shane himself will be running the marathon this year and debated whether moving the wall of sneakers from the back of the store to the front was the right move. (Although all those neon colors do look pretty from the window.) I joked that I felt old seeing the new &amp;quot;class&amp;quot; of students manning the store&amp;amp;mdash;while there are plenty of full-time employees, there are always students from various universities in the area (Boston College, Boston University, Harvard, MIT, Tufts...) working on weekends or off-days. Seriously, you probably can&amp;#x27;t buy sneakers from a more educated staff of people anywhere else. But I&amp;#x27;m biased. And I also digress. Just as Shane and I were saying goodbye, a few people on the sidewalk stopped to take photos. In the only nod to last year&amp;#x27;s tragedy, Shane said he wishes they would put their cameras away and just enjoy their run instead. &amp;quot;We&amp;#x27;re ready to move on,&amp;quot; he told me, looking a bit tired. I can understand that. Marathon Sports has become a sort of makeshift memorial for people to grieve and pay respects to victims who were hurt just outside its door a year ago. But the store had for so many years been such a happy place&amp;amp;mdash;it makes sense Shane and the owner of Marathon Sports, Colin Peddie, would want that upbeat feeling back. So for them, I hope that this week, when the store gets its regular rush of customers leading up to the Boston Marathon (which will take place on Monday, April 21), they will talk race times and sore calves, energy gels and chafing. You know, all the weird, sometimes gross things runners usually talk about before a big race. And not because they&amp;#x27;ve forgotten what happened there, but rather, because they will always remember. The things not said might perhaps be the best &amp;quot;thank you&amp;quot; any of us could give&amp;amp;mdash;a fresh start, on a fresh race day, for some of the many good people who&amp;#x27;ve remained Boston Strong. Want to help support victims of the Boston Marathon bombing? Check out One Fund Boston at onefund.org, where you can donate to help those most affected. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.glamour.com/health-fitness/blogs/vitamin-g/2014/04/boston-marathon-sports-bombing>