Of all charities, I badly wanted to run the Marathon on behalf of the Boys & Girls Club because of its connection to my girlfriend, Tara. Growing up in South Boston, she found a comfortable home at the Club. During her high school years, she gave back to the Club as a volunteer and when she applied to college, the Club paid for her application fees (she won a partial scholarship to Northeastern, where I was lucky enough to meet her eight years ago). From there, she went on to receive a masters in public health at Boston University. She has often said that once her student loans are repaid, she is planning to regularly donate to the Club. Running the Boston Marathon in the name of the Boys & Girls Clubs gives us a head start at giving back to the organization that gave her structure from an early age through bumpy formative years. There is no charity that I can think of that would have as much personal meaning for us as a couple.