“So, Ms. Jaclyn, how did you prepare for the Junior Olympics?” I glanced over at her, standing behind me in a white fur jacket, dark brown hair flowing down to her mid-back. I looked back at my computer screen, and breathed out. The air was frigid. We were in an ice rink for a competition.
“Well,” my coach said, deep in thought. Her eyebrows were furrowed, and her gaze was directed to the ceiling. “I trained twice a day, before school and in the afternoon. I did a lot of off-ice training too, and ballet. It was very important to run through my program twice, off ice and on ice.”
Jaclyn Lewis had trained a ton for this shot at the Olympics. It was intense thinking about it!
“How did you feel when you made it to the Junior Olympics?”
“I felt very excited and nervous.” She gave a laugh, hoping to break the air.
“Did you have to make any sacrifices along the way to becoming an Olympic-bound champion?”
Jaclyn sighed, and disappointment flooded the wall of air between us. “There were a lot of things.” She told me of all of the sorrows of not having sleepovers, and having to be homeschooled from 7th grade on.
That’s right. I don’t give up much for skating, yet my coach gave up everything. She didn’t get to do any of the cool stuff that I’ll get to do at high school, and she didn’t get to have the social experience, like hanging out with friends at lunch or chatting before school starts about this and that. I can’t imagine it. My coach gave up everything to go to the gargantuan Olympics. I stared out the window, watching the cars zoom by and screeching in and out of parking spaces as I mulled over what her experience must have been like.
“So, how did you feel during the competition? Were you nervous? Determined?”
Jaclyn recounted her feelings from the smile that never left her face to the nervousness of looking at that ice.
She smiled, and her cheeks creased upwards as she remembered the last part. It reminded me of how a petulant child’s face would look after her father had given her the right doll.
I knew the feeling well. Worrying that your blades will break once you get on the ice, not that you’ll hurt yourself, but you’ll make a fool out of yourself. You look at the ice, and you have to look away so you don’t see the other people fall during their routines. It must’ve been insane, yet awesomely fun at the Junior Olympics!
As my coach was skating her long program, she fell to the ice with a thud and searing pain. Something in her foot was numb, and mangled. It was shattered. “How did you feel?” I asked.
“Well” she answered, grave and yet also light. She moved her arms up to her chest and hunched her shoulders closer to her chin, looking not like a sad person, but someone who was pouting! “It kinda sucked. She smiled again, and laughed heartily. “It hurt a whole lot, and I knew that I’d have to give up all of the skating I’d done competitively and that was a let-down. But I get to coach, and that’s really fun!” Her mood lightened. My coach was amazing at that kind of stuff; being able to remember something sad, but lighten herself up and not darken others’ moods.
“Well, thanks!” I said, hitting the save button and closing my laptop.
“Okay, get your skates on, you’re on in 20 minutes, and you need to get warmed up beforehand, too!” She said, confidently and jokingly, as more of a best friend than just a coach. I knew that she had stopped pushing herself after her dream; that would be futile. But if I wanted to go after that same dream, she could and definitely would help me along!
