The athlete's years of preparation, personal and financial planning for the sport they love. The athlete's perseverance and sacrificial character is assumed before the athlete performs.

So, as a six-grade kid, I learned from that episode, that I would never be in a car with others drinking alcohol. It was a commitment that I made for myself.

I remember one night of skating when I was in the 6th grade. A friend and I went roller skating on the “teen night.” The roller-skating rink was about a 20-minute car ride from home. 

I knew when we finished skating her older sister would be there to give us a ride home. Unbeknownst to me, her teen sister was driving the car with three other teens her age. 

I put the box down. I then leaned toward the box so I could pick up the bat. Well, the bat had other ideas…

Having raised baby chicks, I knew light would get some warmth on the bat. The bat was still playing dead, but I also sensed he was cold, not dead. It was a bit chilly on this winter January day.

He lay motionless curled up in a brown leaf. I knew he was not dead but instead he lay motionless to “play dead” to fool us into thinking he was dead. His ploy did not work on me. 

“I can no longer stand the person I am knowing that what I did when I was ten put a man in the penitentiary for life” Sue said to her husband.

As Sue’s planned her child’s ten-year olds birthday party memories from Tacoma kept interrupting her thinking…She thought about the lie she had told to the police when she was ten. She still remembered how much she hated Jerry. She thought about her mother. She thought about all the illegal drugs Jerry had sold to her Mom.