Accident won’t fill victim with pity

For five months now, Kirk Williams has searched for meaning in the accident that took his body from the chest down.

He remembers everything. What gear he was in. Going over the handlebars. Lying face down in the sand, thinking he might suffocate. He remembers the numb feeling, similar to when you hit your funny bone. Only that numb feeling never left. Still hasn't.

Kirk Williams loved to ride his bike. In eighth grade, when his friends' idea of a bike ride was a trip to the ice cream shop, Kirk would meet men three times his age at Poor Farm Park to pound the trails. As a junior at Patrick Henry High, he won his age group at the XTERRA East Regional Championship triathlon in Richmond. He went to the University of Colorado in Boulder partly because of the opportunities to ride.

When you love to ride a mountain bike as much as Williams did, you fall a lot. Williams had fallen from 20 feet in the air and dusted himself off. So, where's the meaning in becoming a quadriplegic after the lowest of low-speed accidents?

Yet that's what he told his buddies on the helicopter ride to the hospital.

"I remember saying that everything happens for a reason," Kirk said by phone earlier this week. "And I still fully believe that. I'm just not really sure what the reason is quite yet."

That's not self-pity; it's honesty. You'll get none of the former and much of the latter from the 23-year-old Ashland native.

Williams, who has use of one of his triceps, both biceps, his shoulders and everything above, gave in to exactly one day of feeling sorry for himself at Craig Hospital in Denver. It wasn't even a full day.

"I go out into the hallway and see people who are using sip-and-puff wheelchairs and can't move their arms at all," he remembers. "It dawned on me that I'm lucky to have the function I do have."

At that moment, words such as fair and unfair exited his vocabulary. What purpose would they serve? Was it fair that a career in adventure photography was gaining momentum the day he was injured? Didn't matter. He couldn't afford to look back.

"From that day forward, I said I'm going to take what I've got and run with it. What can I do? How can I get stronger? Rather than focusing the energy on being upset, I focused the energy on getting as strong as I can as fast as I can because I want to get back to independence as soon as I can."

There's reason to hope, but Kirk and his family aren't blind to the long odds he faces. The doctors explained that the accident badly bruised, but didn't sever, his spinal cord.

"The physicians can't promise you anything, but they always say, 'The cord is still there so we can't promise anything won't come back.' It might," said Kirk's father, Ray. "He's hopeful that, either through therapy or medical breakthroughs, he'll get his legs back. But he'll say, 'I can't wait around for it. I've got to see what I can do with what I've got.'"

With injuries such as Kirk's, patients usually have about 18 to 24 months in which larger-scale improvements in muscle and motor function are possible. The energy Kirk used to put into mountain biking, skiing and rock climbing now is focused entirely on doing all he can with that window of time.

But massage therapy, acupuncture and occupational therapy sessions aren't cheap or covered by insurance. Kirk plays quadriplegic rugby, a crucial mental and physical release. A quad rugby chair costs upward of $6,000.

His family can't afford these things by themselves. Luckily, Kirk's story has inspired many to help. A bike shop he worked at in Boulder held a fundraiser. So did Echo Lake Elementary, where his mom works. On April 17 and 18, there'll be opportunities for Central Virginians to pitch in. A Web site, http://www.kwrollout.com, has more details, but there'll be a dinner and silent auction the first day and multiple-distance bike rides the second, all in the Ashland area.

Only Kirk Williams can determine if there was a larger meaning for him in the accident that took so much of his old life. The rest of us must draw our own conclusions.

Is there meaning in the fact that the hiker Kirk braked to avoid hitting was a doctor and, according to Ray, saved Kirk from suffocating when he saw what happened?

Is there meaning in the way Kirk was hurt, doing the one activity he loved most?

Is there meaning in two feuding friends of Kirk's burying the hatchet after the accident, deciding their disagreement was petty?

Is there meaning in Kirk's brother Clayton dropping his life in Portland to be a primary caregiver?

And then there's the community of people whom Kirk's story has touched.

Kirk and Clayton will be in Ashland for the events next weekend. There, Kirk will find people he's never met running, biking and donating their money all to help him fashion a life -- a new life -- and keep searching.

Contact Andy Thompson at