They had simple plans, and grand ones.
Staff Sgt. Marc Small would return from Afghanistan, where he served with 1st Battalion, 3rd Special Forces Group (Airborne), and marry his fiancée, Amanda Charney. He'd hit the books and become a physician assistant. She'd run a home-based speech and language pathology practice for children — Small Steps in Speech would be a good name, he figured. They'd start a family outside of Philadelphia.
They would run at least one marathon. They would visit every continent.
Plans changed Feb. 12, 2009, three weeks into Small's deployment, when the Special Forces medic died in Faramuz after insurgents attacked his unit with rocket-propelled grenades.
In a fog of grief so thick she still doesn't remember many details, Charney set about preparing for Small's funeral. That included creating a charity organization to accept donations in Small's memory.
When Amanda Charney ran the marathon in New York, she ran with the memory of her fallen soldier.
Photo Credit: Courtesy Amanda Charney
Small Steps in Speech would be a good name, she figured.
Friends offered comfort by designing logos and putting paperwork together.
"After I lost Marc ... I think I was a walking zombie," Charney said in a Nov. 7 interview. "I'm glad that my job even kept me. I don't know how it happened so quickly — before we even had his funeral ... within days, we already had fliers.
"We were thinking it would be something small, a one-time check. I mean, 'In lieu of flowers ....' "
More than five years later, Small Steps in Speech has collected about $400,000 that's been spread throughout the country, helping families pay for a child's speech therapy made necessary by medical conditions such as autism, apraxia and others. Charney heads an all-volunteer board that includes Small's mother, Mary MacFarland, as president.
"People ask to volunteer all the time," Charney said. "We have an accountant who was a neighbor of Marc's — now our treasurer. Nobody takes a salary. It all goes directly to these children."
Charney, who works as a speech and language pathologist with a public school system in New Jersey, hasn't limited her charity work to the foundation. She's made several trips to help children across the globe — solo journeys into impoverished areas, mostly, but with spectacular side trips.
"Four years ago, I lived in India for the summer, in the slums, working with child orphans with disabilities," she said. "I brought some of his ashes, and I was able to go to the Taj Mahal. Last year, I picked Africa, and I was able to work with child orphans with AIDS and malaria ... and I was able to go hike Kilimanjaro, and I brought some of his ashes."
Last summer came a trip to the Great Wall of China. And Nov. 2, Charney — and Small — ran a marathon.
"Marc had a bucket list. I had a bucket list. He always wanted to do a marathon," she said. "He was impacted by 9/11 so bad, that's why he volunteered to serve in the military. ... What better place to do it than New York City?"
Staff Sgt. Marc Smallin Afghanistan.
Photo Credit: Courtesy Amanda Charney
Charney, 35, found a friend who secured her a spot in the race's hard-to-crack field. With Small's ashes in a run belt, she finished in 5 hours, 14 minutes, 52 seconds — about an hour slower than her previous race, she said, because of an overtraining injury.
She kept a simple mantra: "I'm going to finish this damn race."
Runner's World told her marathon story, leading to a flood of social-media comments — most offering support and kind words, and a few, she said, "a little bit hurtful ... saying, 'She needs to get over it.' "
She sees the run, the trips and the foundation as ways to continue Small's memory — to achieve, in some part, some of the goals he never realized.
"He changed my life," Charney said. "He showed me how to love and how to give love, and I just want to fulfill some of the things he wanted. And I wanted, too. We're doing them together, in our own way."
Kevin Lilley is the features editor of Military Times.
