Welcome to the AIDSRide.

And thank you for everything it took for you to get here.

We live in a world where 33 million people are HIV-infected.

Where there are ten million little AIDS orphans in sub-Saharan Africa, each with a name, their own unique fingerprints, and as much a right to a life as you or I - wandering the streets of rural Zambia without a mother or father

A world where tens of thousands of HIV-infected Americans lack the health insurance they need to be cared for and have to fight HMOs at the same time they're fighting their disease and side effects of drugs, if they can afford them.

We live in a world of intolerance, hatred, and violence.

A world that is not the world as we wish it would be.

The sorrowful opposite of a vision that most people abandoned in early-childhood out of a sense of its utter impracticality and foolishness.

A world without war?

Impossible.

Without murders?

Impossible.

Without hunger or AIDS?

Impossible.

A group of people on bikes raising $77 million for AIDS charities?

Impossible.

You've all seen our twist on it.

I'mpossible

It's not just a marketing phrase.

I'mpossible.

It is a mantra.

Against the forces of entropy.

Against the cynicism.

Against the despair that envelopes our world.

I'mpossible.

Now, it is yours as well.

When the hills get steep. And they will be steep.

I'mpossible.

When it's raining and you're cold. And you want to quit. And you will want to quit.

I'mpossible.

When you see the guy with the flat, who needs help, but you want to get into camp by 3 and get an early dinner.

I'mpossible.

When you see an absurd opportunity to help someone. Someone lugging a heavy duffel bag across camp. And your head is saying, "it's their own fault -- it's not my responsibility -- they should have packed lighter."

I'mpossible.

The absurdity of a random act of kindness.

I'mpossible.

Create an AIDSRide campsite where there is so much random kindness that the bounty of it, rather than the lack of it, is what becomes ridiculous.

The riders that have gone before you have made the AIDSRide a place of kindness.

Could we make it any kinder?

I'mpossible.

There is a strong you.

A kind you.

A different you.

Struggling to get out.

But all its life -- impossible, impossible, impossible.

When you have the uncontrollable urge to cry at the closing ceremony, but it's always been overcome by a furious controlling mechanism that refuses to allow the real you to be seen in public.

I'mpossible.

And bawl like a baby.

If we could cry for this world.

If we could feel the sorrow of ten million orphans.

Of the lonely Kaposi's-ridden AIDS patient.

If we would open ourselves to the great river of sorrow.

And cry, for once, for this world, for as long as it takes.

We might never stop crying. The world might have to dedicate itself to helping, and to creating the world we all saw when we were children.

You can experiment with that on the AIDSRide. If you allow it to, it will empower a new you. Connected to the sorrow of the world. And the profound beauty of people.

We do not guarantee this kind of a change in you.

It is only slightly more likely here than it is in your regular life.

And the only way you will have even the remotest chance of realizing it is by yelling at the impossible. In every moment, at every level, with every opportunity,

I'mpossible

"Kennedy"

I'mpossible

"Armstrong"

I'mpossible

"King"

Because the truth is, and you and I both know it,

You are

I'mpossible

I'mpossible

I'mpossible.