One Management Society member is making the most of her doctors’ orders.
In 1989, Eve Fee, of Oakley, California, was diagnosed with osteoporosis. Doctors told her walking was the best exercise for her condition. She began walking with her husband, Chris, around the Bay Area. But in 1992, their exercise turned into a goal—to walk across the United States.
The walk began on Halloween 1992, in San Francisco. Chris and Eve both had full-time jobs, and their walking was restricted to Saturdays, holidays, and vacations. By 1997 they had walked through California, Nevada, and half of Idaho. Their U.S. walk was interrupted then when they were called to serve as missionaries in Africa. After their return, they walked from Idaho to South Dakota. Their walk was put on hold again when they went to China to teach English for eleven months with the BYU China Teachers Program.
Last fall they walked from South Dakota to Michigan, and this spring they continued their walk—about fifteen miles each day, six days a week—and arrived in New Hampshire on 25 July. The experience included highlights such as meeting people throughout the country, enjoying the scenery, and being physically fit. But there were also a few drawbacks: bad weather, crazy drivers, sore muscles, mosquitoes, and dogs.
And what did they do when they walked? “Sometimes we went an hour without saying a word. The next hour we solved all the troubles of the country and the mysteries of the universe. Even though we have been married thirty-six years, we found that we grew closer together,” Chris says.
While crossing Nevada at the beginning of their trip, Chris and Eve were stopped by a Highway Patrol Officer and asked if they had seen anyone else walking in the area. They said no. The police had received a report that an elderly couple was wandering the highway. They explained their goal, and as the officer was leaving they heard him say on the radio, “Yeah, that’s them alright.”
Eve graduated from BYU in 1965 with her BA in English. She retired in 1996 as a computer specialist with Chevron. Chris graduated from BYU in 1968 with his BA in Italian and earned his master’s degree from the American University in personnel and human resources management. He worked with the U.S. Attorney’s Office in San Francisco until he retired in 1996.
“The Fees are a model couple. Eve was a working mother who had a career, a family, and was active in the Church,” says Susanne Hickam, treasurer of the East Bay Management Society Chapter. “She is now retired and more active than ever. Eve is a bubbly, cheerful, enthusiastic, spirit-filled woman many admire—including myself.”
