It was just another day at work when I saw Jeremy Piven's, aka as Ari Gold, tweet "will the beautiful women of the world please stand up". Of course, I was thinking this had something to do with Jessica Biel, Jennifer Garner and Heidi Klum. I wondered what he was getting at so I clicked on the link and when I did, it was not what I expected.

The link that Piven had tweeted about was actually a story about a village in Uganda that recently received a freshwater well. Before this well, the women of the village used to walk miles to get water from "putrid rivers or disease-infested swamps". Now clean water was in their backyard. Here is an excerpt from the story:

"I am happy now," Helen, a villager, beamed. "I have time to eat, my children can go to school. And I can even work in my garden, take a shower and then come back for more water if I want! I am bathing so well."

A few of the men chuckled to hear a woman talk about bathing. But all I noticed was Helen's glowing face, the fresh flowers in her hair, and the lovely green dress she wore for special occasions. Touching her forearm, I replied, "Well, you look great."

"Yes," she paused. Placing both hands on my shoulders and smiling, she said, "Now, I am beautiful."

Most of you that know me know I'm not a real runner. I do the occasional couple miles to say I ran, but I never really did much more than that. However, all of that is changing. In December, I signed up to run the Indianapolis Life 500 Festival Mini-Marathon. Little did I know what I was about to get myself into.

Training hasn't been super easy so far, and it's not going to get much easier. It's going to require training, determination, endurance, strength and a whole lot of moral support. Making myself run five days a week is something I'm not used to, and I'm not really a fan of it. To be honest, this is one of the harder things I've done.

However, I think about the women and children who walk miles just to get water, any kind of water, for their families when all I have to do is walk to the water cooler, the water fountain or the fridge and I have water available. I think about how most of that hard-earned water isn't even clean and can infect people with deadly diseases and how 45,000 people die each day from waterborne illnesses. I think about how clean water is something I have never had to worry about; it's always something I've taken for granted. When I think of all this, I know that I can do the run. I know I can raise money and awareness about this cause.

My goal is to raise $5000 for water projects. Because of charity: water's unique model, 100% of all donations go directly to water projects, and each donation is "proved" using Google Earth when projects are complete. You can pledge per mile, you can give a lump sum when I complete my mini-marathon or you can just donate whatever and whenever you want in the next three months. Not to mention, all donations are 100% tax-deductible.

I've never done anything like this before. I can't promise I won't complain but when I do, I'll remember why I'm doing it. If I can reach my goal, then I'll be able to fund one well. Something so simple can change the lives of so many. That one well is going to help 250 people have clean drinking water for 20 years.

When I cross that finish line on May 8th, I'll have plenty of clean drinking water. Can't you help me out so that others can experience what we take for granted every day?