A YORK mum is making a splash for cash by jogging in her swimming pool every day for a month to raise money for the Black Lives Matter fund and her son's volunteering expedition to Africa.
During lockdown Viv Chamberlin-Kidd's husband bought a small pool for the garden. Whilst using the pool for hydrotherapy after sustaining a minor knee injury in an car accident, she thought it would be a unique way to raise money.
Last Thursday Viv, 47, who lives off Beckfield Lane, in Acomb, jogged 25 lengths of the four-metre pool, and every day since then and until July 25, the number of lengths she is jogging is increasing by eight.
July 25 will be six months to the day since her father Tony Kidd died.
Viv said: "It will be great to hit the one kilometre mark on July 24 which will mark what would have been my parent's 55th wedding anniversary, the day before I finish. It seems a fitting tribute to my dad."
Viv knows her dad would be proud that she is splitting the money between her son Zack's trip to Kenya next year in honour of his ancestors and Black Lives Matters because she knows first-hand that her father's mother and her 12 siblings never admitted that their father was black because of fear of racial hatred.
She said only two pictures of them are left because the rest were destroyed in case anyone found out about him.
Viv commented: "Although things might have improved since then there is still a massive way to go for racial equality. It is upsetting to think that little is known about my great-grandfather other than it is believed that his mother was the first generation not born into slavery."
She said to become a 'good ancestor' she will be reading Me and White Supremacy by Layla F Saad, which has 28 daily exercises, during the month.
Everyone who sponsors Viv will be entered into a prize draw for some essential oil prizes as a thank you. Viv can be contacted via Facebook messenger at http://m.me/vckidd
Sponsorship can go directly to the Black Lives Matter fund at https://www.gofundme.com/f/ukblm-fund and to Zack for his Kenya trip via https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/zack-kenya-2021
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