An inspiration like no other.
“He’ll be a vegetable the rest of his life;” Dick says doctors told him And his wife, Judy, when Rick was nine months old. “Put him in an Institution.”
But the Hoyts noticed the way Rick’s eyes followed them around the room so they asked the Engineering department at Tufts University if there was anything to help Rick communicate. “No way,” Dick says he was told. “There’s nothing going on in his brain.”
“Tell him a joke,” Dick countered. They did. Rick laughed. Turns out a Lot was going on in his brain. Rigged up with a computer that allowed Him to control the cursor by touching a switch with the side of his Head, Rick was finally able to communicate. While his parents Dick and Judy debated on whether he would say “Hi Mom or Hi Dad” first, Rick typed “Go Bruins!”
Soon after a high school classmate was paralyzed in an accident and the School organized a charity run for him, Rick pecked out, “Dad, I want To do that.” But how was Dick, a former military man but self-described “porker” nevertheless, push his son five miles? Still, he Tried. “Then it was me who was handicapped,” Dick says. “I was sore For two weeks.”
That day changed Rick’s life. “Dad,” he typed, “when we were running, It felt like I wasn’t disabled anymore!” Dick finally found something where his son could feel like everyone else and he determined to run the race with him. Click here to see what dad & son did.
