Bloomsday Perennial: Paul Chapman fighting Parkinson but plans to run as long as he can

Bloomsday Perennial Paul Chapman blames his friends for getting him involved in Bloomsday and, years later, convincing him to run marathons.

“I got caught up in it,” he said.

Chapman, now 79, was roommates with United Airlines ground crew coworkers Jack Charbonneau, who is also a Bloomsday Perennial, and Fred Dehaven. Dehaven was the runner of the bunch and convinced the other two to do Bloomsday with him.

“It was just something he was doing,” Chapman said. “We just got caught up in it.”

Chapman said none of them thought Bloomsday was a big deal at first. “We didn’t know, 50 years later, we’d still be running.”

He was able to finish the first Bloomsday in under an hour, despite the hot weather that year.

“I do remember the heat,” he said. “I was alive at the end.”

Chapman caught the running bug and started doing other fun runs.

His fastest Bloomsday finishing time, logged in 1983, was 42 minutes , 10 seconds. Chapman said he never set any speed records.

Then he expanded to marathons. “There was a period of time there I was running three or four marathons a year,” he said. “I worked for the airline, so we got to go to a lot of fancy marathons.”

Bloomsday became a family affair. His wife Diane has done several Bloomsdays and once his kids got old enough, they joined in. Chapman would blare “Bloomsday Blues” and the “Rocky” theme song on Bloomsday mornings to wake everyone in the house up.

“He was going to do Bloomsday,” Diane said. “We all knew that. The kids, instead of standing and watching, decided to run with him. We never caught up with him.”

There were years that Chapman would run with his children, but unconventionally. He’d do the race, then turn around and do the course backwards until he found them so they could finish together. After the race was over, they’d often go on a picnic.

Chapman’s one regret is that in the early years he didn’t realize how important his Bloomsday finisher T-shirts were and he was careless with them. “I would use them to wash the car,” he said. “There’s some missing ones.”

He retired at 55 and became a self-described golf addict. He stopped running marathons. “I was tired,” he said.

During his working years, Chapman was the picture of health.

Somewhere along the way, Chapman’s hands began to shake. He assumed it was essential tremors and didn’t do anything about it. Then the shaking got worse. He was diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease in 2020. Still, he was optimistic.

“When I first got it, I thought, well, this isn’t so bad,” he said.

But his Parkinson’s symptoms have continued to progress. His hands and feet have significant tremors and he often finds it hard to talk, has problems with his memory and issues with his blood pressure. Some days are better than others, Chapman said.

He has been doing Bloomsday virtually since 2020 because it gives him a window of time to complete the required distance and he can pick a good symptom day. He usually walks with his daughter Mindy and his wife will meet the duo in several spots on their route to provide water and see if Chapman needs anything.

This year, for the 50th Bloomsday, Chapman is hoping to make it downtown on the first Sunday in May. “It depends on how I feel,” he said. “I’d rather go downtown if I can, but I really have mixed feelings about that.”

Chapman said his Parkinson’s means that he will take Bloomsday one year at a time, adding he wants to continue to do it as long as he can.

“We’re just going to work on this year and then worry about it,” Diane Chapman said.