How I became a writer Part XX

Title: How I became a writer

Part XX

In tenth grade a track athlete I called Miss Hyler, came up to me early in the season.  “I want to run the 100 meter dash,” she said, out of the blue.  I blinked in surprise.  Miss Hyler had made state qualifiers in 7^th grade in the 3200 relay!  I saw her more as a talented middle-distance runner than a sprinter.  “Okay,” I said very slowly, “I’ll let you try it.”  The next meet she burst from her blocks and exploded to the finish line.  My eyebrows went up at her time, which was in the 13s.  I smirked at her and said, “Okay, you can be a sprinter.”  Kaitlin Huyler went on to be our star 100 meter sprinter and a deadly part of the 400 relay.  Her sophomore year we were up against a 400 relay team that on paper was better than us but not as experienced.  Our girls didn’t crack under the pressure beating the better team for sectional patches.  The next week at state qualifiers, they beat us, but it didn’t matter.  You don’t get a sectional patch for beating a team at state qualifiers and neither of our teams were good enough for a states run.  Mr. Davis felt Kaitlin’s confidence played a large role in that sectional victory.  Now it was her senior year and I felt she would lead our team well.

Her friend Kendall Austin was also an amazing athlete.  She also made state qualifiers in the 3200 relay in seventh grade but also had made a transition down to short distance.  Kendall was an amazing 100 hurdler, was also deadly in the 400 relay, had tied the school record in the 200 dash, and was a critical part of the 1600 relay!  She was also a senior too and seemed like she would make an excellent team captain!

Then Miss Huyler got mono and Miss Austin was also unable to compete due to health reasons,  I was shocked.  The Lord had always blessed me with good track teams over the years and it at first appeared that the new season would be no exception, but now?  I was used to having older girls be the heroes and mentors of the younger girls and I think this has been the secret behind JT being a good team every year.  I’ve watched teams that used to be phenomenal for over half a decade drift into becoming a poor team!  I honestly believe it has a lot to do with the attitude of the team, a the lack of team heroes, and leadership that lacks high moral character.  I have been blessed with many highly ethical team captains!  That year, I looked at my roster and a sinking feeling grew in my stomach.  “Would this be the year JT started drifting toward being an okay or bad program?” I wondered.  I had two junior girls that were my only candidates for team captains.  Both girls were solid track athletes but they had a VERY green team behind them.  Did these two juniors, McKenzie Prutsman and Morgan Leach have what it took to instill confidence in the younger girls?  Oh, did they ever!!

McKenzie Prutsman did not fold under the pressure but radiated confidence and work ethic to the younger girls.  Over the next two years she would accomplish so much and be one of the sections best runners but I think as a team Captain she would accomplish far more!  Some of those green girls with unimpressive skills as freshmen would turn out to be some of the best athletes I’ve ever had!  Little Meg Rogers and Vanessa Helgeland would go on to become awesome team captains themselves, accomplish amazing things in their career, and go on to compete in track and field at the college level!  I think McKenzie had a lot to do with setting that tone for them and helping them to believe that they could be great!  I know McKenzie had an impact on my daughter.  Autumn had just tested up for varsity in seventh grade and was my gutsy pole vault girl!  I didn’t realize how much of an impact McKenzie had on her until ninth grade after McKenzie graduated.  Autumn was determined to step it up to fill the large gap left with McKenzie heading for college and told me so.  Beth Williams later would become an excellent Captain for me and I think McKenzie helped mold her too.

Morgan was a thrower and as is often the case for a thrower, did not often get the praise of the crowd for an amazing victory.  But Morgan brought incredible work ethic and a wonderful sense of humor to our team.  She was the perfect match for McKenzie and made our warm ups so fun as she would make us laugh on the most ordinary or even dreary days.  I have seen that influence over and over in my last few captains, who also keep a sense of humor during warm ups.  It might not seem important, but a little laughter is great medicine for a team!

What should have been a nightmare year of us getting pounded into the ground was reversed into another great season!  McKenzie and Morgan pointed the way for the younger girls and they began to rise to the occasion!  Having the young, seventh grade super star Taryn Hayes didn’t hurt anything either, but even she needed good leadership!

A peer mentor is very important!  I had one in soccer named Fred Gribbon who had a huge impact on me.  I think if I did a scientific study of successful sports programs, I would find that older student leadership was a key ingredient.  I don’t care how good your coach is, it is very hard to be a successful team without good captains and veterans setting the tone!  When I say good, I don’t merely mean athletic talent, I’m talking character!  When I heard McKenzie had become the team captain of her college basketball team before her senior year, it did not surprise me at all!  She is one of those girls who has talent and high moral character!  Any program will get so much better with that kind of leader!  (By the way, many team captains before McKenzie were awesome and our program owes so much to them too, but the teams they were on had a lot of talent.  McKenzie and Morgan took over a team that would start out significantly weaker.  A team that could have lost that tradition of excellence in a hurry!)  

In my first novel, the boys of the junior unit C-3 are far below average... in fact, they are the worst junior unit in their entire mountain!  They are very selfish and have many large character flaws that are actually being reinforced by their well-meaning parents.  C-3 is just marking time and can’t wait to leave the war against the dark behind as soon as they are adults.  Then they get a junior leader named Risk Xie.  Risk is black but he is not African American (at least in culture) having grown up as an orphan in China.  In the alternate history of the C-3 universe, China’s cultural revolution happens much later in history and Risk witnesses some of it as it destroys his rich adopted parents.  Risk spends the first novel dragging the unlikely heroes of C-3 to a point of deciding to dedicate themselves to fighting the dark.  It is a long and hard road and Risk endures much to get them to that point.  Risk is every readers favorite character without exception!  You can’t help but fall in love with him as he heroically pours himself into the boys of C-3.  Risk is not a perfect character and has his own demons to fight but when the chips are down you can count on Risk to make the right decisions no matter what the cost.  When readers discovered Risk was not the main character of the series they were horrified.  Like so many team captains that I have had, Risk is passing the baton to the boys of C-3 and they must grow to become heroes themselves.  Risk is still in the series and the very last book will be named after him (book nine’s title will be “Maximum Risk”) but he is a mentor figure more than a main character.  His impact is felt through the entire series and in book six when the C-3 boys are in charge of mentoring a new unit, they often talk about how Risk trained them.  Risk is the team captain every team wants... no, every team needs!  He is a captain who is passionate, moral, and sets the bar high for those who come after him.