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Ride Report for Ride Captain RJ
It was a happy group of riders that gathered just a few short blocks from Rush Hospital (Chicago, IL) where our unsuspecting hero was going about her business as an ER nurse, just returned from a long and painful recovery from injuries sustained during her latest deployment to Afghanistan.  Captain Hedge never complained, making her all that much more deserving of the rock star treatment about to descend on her workplace.

Nurse Sherry Hedge secretly and unceremoniously enlisted in the Army shortly after 9/11.  She’s been deployed across the globe, 3 times to Afghanistan, where she injured her knees jumping out of helicopters to offer assistance to wounded soldiers.  That is the hero we gather for on that sunny March afternoon.  That is the hero that is the American warrior.

With Chicago PD and Fire Department command vehicles leading the way, motorcycles following and fire trucks and ambulances bringing up the rear, we made our way through the crowded hospital neighborhood to the hospital entrance, where a crowd of family, friends, hospital employees, TV crews and Capt. Hedge’s mother were waiting.  It was controlled pandemonium and it was awesome.

Inside, department heads spoke and a letter from Mayor Rahm Emanuel was read before WWR presentations were made.  Not wanting us to leave, Capt Hedge insisted on a ride with our group, with which we were only too happy to oblige, lights flashing, sirens blaring.  We dropped her back at the hospital where she told her husband, Tom (they got married on Veterans Day 11/11/11)that she was going to get a bike so that she could ride with us.  His only comment was, “Me, too?”

RJ