Ben Davis Keeps His Promise To Meemaw

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January 4, 2012

a project of CharityFocus

What saves a man is to take a step. Then another step. It is always the same step, but you have to take it.

- Antoine de Saint-ExupÃ©ry -

Ben Davis Keeps His Promise To Meemaw

One van. One father. One son. Thirty-one cities. 30,724 pounds lost among 1,516 participants. 1,255,740 views on YouTube. When Ben Davis makes a promise to his Meemaw, he means business. It was Christmas Eve of 2008 when Ben's grandmother expressed her concern for him simply by asking whether he was happy. "I was 360 pounds," Ben told me. "I was in a deep depression, I had lost a relationship as a direct result of the depression -- I was, in no way, happy -- and her inquisition that night ... it pushed me to really examine my life and spurred me to get it together. To get a grip and get my life back on track." Inspired, he went home that night and got his grandmother a last-minute gift: the URL of a Tumblr blog he had started to track his progress. { read more }