Walk-a-thon

The people whose lives are affected by Alzheimer's, whether because they themselves are slowly losing the mind and personality and memories they've long held to be their own or because they love someone who is thus affected, don purple shirts, grip the strings of purple helium balloons, and set off together on a mile-long walk along paved neighborhood walking paths. In the months prior to outfitting themselves with purple shirts and purple balloons, the people who are now walking have asked, or maybe even implored, their friends, colleagues, and families to support their efforts by donating maybe $10 or $25 or even $50 toward their cause. They have set what feel like ambitious fundraising goals: $150 or $250 or, more rarely, 1,000 dollars. They hope their months of effort and ingratiation and, in the cases of people who are otherwise not accustomed to walking one mile at a time, physical preparation will aid the people and organizations that study Alzheimer's and perhaps expedite research into possible and effective treatments for the disease that is gradually or, in some cases, swiftly stealing their lives or the life of a person or several persons whom they love.

The paths on which the purple-appareled people are walking wind their way along a quick-moving creek that is fed by snowmelt from the mountains above before meandering through a local neighborhood. The neighborhood is filled with multimillion-dollar mansions situated on plots of lands that alone cost sometimes a quarter or half a million dollars. The mansions are inhabited for perhaps two weeks or two months or, in exceptionally rare cases, six months out of each year. During the months in which the mansions are not inhabited, the buildings' owners reside instead in their multimillion-dollar mansions elsewhere in the country. They fly between their two homes on private jets that are given special takeoff and landing privileges, even if it means inconveniencing the hundreds of passengers who sit waiting aboard the commercial aircraft that depart occasionally from the valley floor.