Vaught

It was not only the feel good story of the year but it was the greatest underdog comeback — ever. We loved it. And we couldn’t get enough of it.

This is what happened.

In 2005, Steve Vaught; an obese man of 400 pounds, a married, ex-marine with young children — saw that his world was spiraling out of control. He wanted to gain his health and his life back. So, with the support of his family, he decided to do something drastic. He would walk — yes, walk — across the country from his home in  Seaside, California, to New York City, on a spiritual and mental journey. He would walk 3,000 miles. And when he got to New York City he would be the man, the father and the husband, that he had always wanted to be.

So, Steve said goodbye to his family — his wife April, his infant son Nicholas and his two year old daughter Clara — and began walking, very slowly, heading east. Always east. His wife created a website for him — fatmanwalking.com — to track his movements and to add in journal entries that Steve would dictate to her from the road.

It didn’t take long for the word to spread of Steve’s walk and people began logging into the website — a few people at first and then a few more until millions were on the site. Then people would wait for him along his route to have their pictures taken and encourage him. Then the media became interested. Then manufacturers contacted him; hiking, camping, walking shoe companies; all donating equipment for Steve to use.

And — when Steve was not even half way through his walk — Harper Collins offered him a lucrative book deal with a $150,000 advance and assigned a ghostwriter to do all the actual writing; the publisher quickly got a $70,000 check out along with a book contract. Oh — and this was besides the documentary film crew that began filming him and offered him a distribution deal. And I’m not even including the worldwide media coverage that came everywhere from CNN to Oprah to the BBC.

Steve Vaught had become America’s darling. In fact, Katy Couric used those very words the next morning after Steve entered New York City on May 9th of 2006, this completing his trip and appeared at the Today Show studios to talk about his journey.

Now that was in May of 2006. And by September of 2006 — three months after completing his famous 3,000 mile trek — Steve Vaught was divorced, broke, unemployed and living in a Super 8 Motel (an actual step up from sleeping in his car where he had been until it was sold to avoid repossession), declaring bankruptcy and fending off lawsuits and creditors.

Harper Collins wanted their advance back, stating they cannot work with him. The documentary company has shelved the project with no plans of ever completing it and a plan for a fat man walking series of runs and speaking engagements were cancelled.

What?

How —? How — did that all happen?

The idea of a fat man, walking across the country, taming his demons, is a great story. An amazing story. And it’s easy to become attracted to it and want to learn more, which is why the interest grew so quickly. But here are the facts.

Vaught abandoned his struggling young family to take this walk. Yeah I know, abandoned is a tough word since it was possible that he could have walked away with $150,000 dollars in his pocket afterwards to better support them — something he did not know or expect when he left. But still, it was a gamble and it demonstrated where his priorities were when he would leave a family who was already in serious financial trouble and needed him as a provider and a father. This character flaw would show itself in other ways.

Vaught went walking but still did not deal with his addiction to food — of all the photos from the website and the video, he eats all the wrong foods and a whole lot of them. A whole lot. For a man on a journey to fight his addictions, it looks like he didn’t fight at all but simply took them on the road.

Steve Vaught has no problem accepting charity. In fact, Steve was glad to receive donations from people on the road as well as donations through his website. Not a problem at all. If you are walking across the country, it’s almost expected that you’ll need some help along the way. But he quickly began to expect these gifts and feel entitled to them and it appears that this practice has not stopped. On one of his most recent Twitter posts, almost ten years after his famous walk, Steve is asking complete strangers to donate money so he can open up an auto repair facility. Before that he was asking for donation so he could pay his rent. These are not the qualities we like to see in our heroes.

There is some question if Steve actually did walk the entire way from California to New York. In fact, on one occasion, he walked 114 miles around Albuquerque in a single day. That’s a very long way to walk for a man who moved at a snail’s pace and averaged anywhere from zero to fourth miles a day. So that was also the highest single day he had ever walked — by triple. But Steve states that he did walk that distance and he did not take a single ride.

Steve Vaught did not lose much weight. In fact, he lost very little weight. Accounts vary since there was not an official weigh in and weigh out. Steve stated he lost 100 pounds and then other times said 60 pounds. But if you look at the before and after photos, there’s not a big difference. In fact, hardly any. And for such a journey we wanted to share in were expecting a spiritual and physical transformation.

Vaught talks about his journey but if you read the journals and his blog, he doesn’t seemed to have changed much as a person over that trip. We don’t read of any epiphanies or adjustment in his outlook. He doesn’t talk of being blessed or lucky. He doesn’t become humbled. He just walked.

Walking across the country should take about six months. It took Steve Vaught over one full year because he flew back to California more than once — and on one occasion he stayed there for several months working with a personal trainer.

And …

Steve Vaught is not a very nice person. He just isn’t. He is self-focused, a little egotistical and he believes that he is entitled to a whole lot more than he has and is waiting to be given it.

Which goes to prove — what?

Well, it goes to prove that opportunity is easy. It’s out there all around us. Everywhere. Big opportunity. But our character will determine if we can capture that opportunity and keep it. Or if it will just burn away.

Carl Bagley, one of the directors on the now defunct documentary project about Steve Vaught, was quoted as saying, “It’s an amazing thing about America: We can make anybody a hero. Whether they deserve it or not.”

BY:

evdemorier@aol.com

Everett De Morier has appeared on CNN, Fox News Network, NPR, ABC, as well as in The New York Times and The London Times. He is the author of Crib Notes for the First Year of Marriage: A...


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