I know this is supposed to be a blog about the Minnesota Twins and their season, but I wanted to share a quick story about a boy, Josiah Viera. I was just watching Outside The Lines on ESPN and they were sharing stories of kids with illnesses, disabilities, etc. Josiah Viera has genetic disease called Progeria.
Progeria is a condition where the symptoms resemble a rapidly aging body at a young age. It is so rare, that is occurs in only one-in-four million kids around the world. Josiah is one of those kids. However, this hasn’t stopped Josiah from living his life the way he wants to. Despite having to go to the hospital every day, he displays his love for baseball proudly.
He plays baseball whenever he can and he even bugs his sister and mother to play with him until they give in and go out and throw the baseball with him. But his one dream is to play baseball on a recreational team. Well that dream came true last year. He was able to play in the Tri-Valley Baseball League. He hit the ball in every at-bat and even had people from out of town come and watch him as word got out about him.
Since then, he has lived the celebrity life. He has gotten to meet a lot of athletes, but none was as special as his day with his favorite baseball player, Ryan Howard.
This may not mean a lot to some people, but the fact that he is able to continue to live his life and continue to play the game he loves, it just makes you stop and think about how fortunate we are all and that this could have be any of us.
Also, the fact that a multi-millionaire athlete like Ryan Howard will take the time and spend the day with Josiah is just so amazing.
Anyways, I just wanted to share the story of Josiah as we reach the holiday season and just how the simple game of baseball can touch and change a kids life.
To see more on Josiah, you can visit this link, http://search.espn.go.com/josiah-viera/videos/6
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