MAY 23, 2010 - SECOND ANNUAL CULLY'S RUN

See photos from Cully's Run 2009 by David Weisman P'10, and the articles written about last year's succesful event in The Dartmouth and The Valley News.

A special thanks to our Cully's Run 2010 Sponsors:

The Puffer Fish Story
By Kevin Cullinan

The pufferfish figure on the award has a lot to do with indomitability and with humor, but mostly I have come to associate it with Katy’s support for others, and here’s why. 

In middle-school, Katy’s art class was tasked to make masks of the sort used in primitive societies’ rituals to symbolize those virtues which such societies value—strength, bravery, martial expertise, that sort of thing.  Katy chose instead to make a spherical helmet in the shape of an inflated pufferfish, that curious little fish whose only defense against predators is to inflate itself to three times its normal size, to make itself appear too large and spikey to be eaten.  It was a perfectly ridiculous choice, but masterfully executed: with the eyes bugging out, the cheeks stretched absurdly behind pursed lips—who knew fish had lips?—it looked so desperate and determined that it almost seemed human.  When the class’s artwork was exhibited to the parents, eyes invariably fell upon the pufferfish, followed by smiles, and often, out-loud laughter.  Its lasting effect, though, was to leave you with a smile and perhaps a flicker of admiration for that little survivor. 

Katy then found that she could actually draw the pufferfish in such a way as to capture that ridiculous determination.  And she found that drawing it that way for someone could elicit a smile.  So she began to leave it for people, sometimes but not always friends, whom she thought needed encouragement, needed a smile and a little support in a dark moment.  Looking back, I think it was a kind of pixie dust she used to bring support, warmth and kindness to world she knew is often less than beautiful.  So when you think upon the virtues which this award honors, if you look at that tiny round pufferfish about to burst and you start to smile just a little at the corners of your mouth, then maybe Katy has sprinkled a little of that pixie dust on you, too.  Pass it on. 

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