Winning Balance

by Nancy French

  We lived in West Des Moines, Iowa, which is a suburb of our state’s capital city. Though our state is known for all the politicking that goes on here, my family never really paid attention to the politicians who showed up every four years. To us Des Moines was the “insurance capital of the world,” because for some reason our city has attracted a huge insurance industry. America’s heartland is a wonderful place to grow up. The people are incredibly friendly and pull together in good times and bad. West Des Moines will always feel like home to me.

  My family has lived in the same house at the end of a cul-de-sac in a quiet little neighborhood since I was six. We had friendly neighbors, a good backyard, a big tree that I loved to climb, and railroad tracks that provided the perfect soundtrack for childhood. When the train passed during the day, it was so common I didn’t really notice it. But at night, as I lay in bed, I’d hear it slowly churning by, blasting a warning whistle as it passed through the town. For me, it was comforting. Some of our neighbors didn’t like the sound, but to me it defined childhood as much as carrying my lunch box to school or playing with my dad in the cul-de-sac.

  I was always Dad’s little sidekick, and as I got older, he taught me things that most girls my age never learned. Plus, we would spend hours and hours fishing. I loved being outside, but some things did make me squeamish. Mostly, I had an intense fear of bugs. I hated them, I didn’t want to see them, and I’d sometimes slightly overreact when I saw them. Okay, I’d freak out. But Dad was always there to take care of the creepy crawlies, and I appreciated him for that.

  Though we had a peaceful life, I tried my best to spice it up. I’m an adrenaline junkie . . . a trait I must’ve inherited from my dad. He played hockey, raced cars, and loved to have adventures. Like him, I tried to get an adrenaline rush out of anything when I was a kid. There was a house at the top of the hill before the turn onto our street, and my friends and I used to take skateboards up there. All five of us would line up in a row, sit on our skateboards, and use our hands to push ourselves as fast as we could down the street. Of course, we wanted to see who could make it to the end without wiping out halfway down.

  Though my parents tolerated my daredevil antics and wholeheartedly supported my passion for gymnastics, they always made it clear that they were most concerned about the way I treated other people. In elementary school, one of my classmates was a brilliant kid with limited social skills. On top of that, he was big for his age. When kids made fun of him, he would suddenly explode in anger. Maybe because I often felt misunderstood by my peers, I felt sorry for him. When I noticed he always sat alone on the bus, I began sitting next to him.

  My mom was friendly to him as well, and we sometimes talked about how hurtful kids can act toward those who seem different. My mom reminded me over and over that there is never any reason to hurt someone else’s feelings. We are to “do unto others as we would have them do unto us,” she said. She also told me that though I can’t prevent people from telling lies about me, I can choose to live in such a way that their words never become reality. My character is completely within my control.

  I learned another powerful lesson in second or third grade when my mom picked me up after school with a serious look on her face. I was already squirming a bit when she turned to face me. She told me that she’d gotten a call from my teacher, who had caught me cheating on a test. I was so ashamed that I wanted the ground to swallow me up.

  As I began crying, my mom didn’t lecture me. Instead, she asked me how I had felt inside when I cheated. I said I felt bad. She told me that bad feeling was a voice in my heart telling me that what I was doing was wrong. “If you don’t want to feel that way again,” she said, “you need to listen to that voice.” Little more was said about it, but I’ve tried to pay attention to those inner promptings ever since.

  Through their quiet example and daily instruction, my parents taught me traditional values like kindness, honesty, and the importance of hard work. Yet in other ways I had a nontraditional upbringing. Take my spiritual life, for example. Both of my parents had a strong faith and wanted the same for me, but for a variety of reasons we didn’t regularly attend church like many of our neighbors and friends did.

  Dad grew up going to church occasionally. My mom’s grandparents were very strong and united in their Christian faith, but my mom grew up with one parent who was Southern Baptist and another who was a Reformed Latter-day Saint. She was turned off by all the arguments over factions and minor points of doctrine, as well as the hypocrisy she saw among some people who called themselves Christians.

  Though we were never regular churchgoers, Mom and Dad talked freely with me about God. They taught me to look to him as a tremendous source of comfort and peace through all of life’s ups and downs. They encouraged me to talk with him, and I know my mom regularly prayed for me.

  My mom even had this prayer, which she knew I liked, painted on the wall of my bedroom:

  Now I lay me down to sleep,

  I pray the Lord my soul to keep.

  See me safely through the night,

  And wake me with the morning light.

  Mom always encouraged me to say my prayers at night and taught me basic spiritual values, but I didn’t get a lot of formal instruction in the facts of the Bible except at Christmas or Easter services or at summer vacation Bible school.

  From an early age, I felt drawn to my heavenly Father. Though we didn’t go to services except on major holidays, I always felt at home in church. I particularly loved Easter—both the traditions (like the eggs, the bunny, and the little cookies they’d give you at church) and the promise of new life.

  We didn’t go to church regularly for another reason: since I practiced Monday through Saturday, Sunday was our family day. It was our only day to sleep in, and my mom always cooked breakfast and made a big deal of it. I loved pancakes, which she’d make every morning. On Sundays, however, she’d make me an even bigger stack of pancakes, or would branch out slightly with French toast or waffles. She’d sometimes make eggs, bacon, sausage, or the best homemade “monkey bread.” She’d cut biscuits into quarters, roll them in butter, brown sugar, and cinnamon sugar, and then bake the loaf. She would even pour caramel syrup over it, a nice way to top off our Sunday morning breakfast.

  I’d frequently eat in my pajamas, since we didn’t have to rush off anywhere. Like most kids, I loved watching weekend cartoons—Tom & Jerry, SpongeBob, and Rugrats—which seemed to drive the demands of the gym and school far from my mind. Though we weren’t necessarily at church, Sundays were almost sacred days for Mom and Dad, because it was the one day they had their kid back. My parents didn’t hate religion; they were simply protective of our time together.

  My mom says she realizes now that she had taken her religious instruction for granted because she’d been dragged to church during her childhood and didn’t like it. She just assumed that because she knew the names of the twelve apostles, that knowledge would somehow be passed down to me. She realized that wasn’t going to happen after an awkward encounter I had in the lunchroom.

  “Who’s Joseph?” I asked one day in the school cafeteria.

  I wanted to participate in the conversation my friends were having about Sunday school, but I didn’t have much to contribute. They all looked at me blankly.

  “Who’s Joseph?” they repeated, in disbelief. “You know, the father of Jesus?” They expected recognition to flash across my face, but still . . . nothing.

  That afternoon, when I saw Mom, I told her about the incident.

  “I want to go to church,” I said.

  She looked surprised. “Why don’t we go to church?” I persisted, but I knew. Sunday was my only day off from gymnastics.

  Mom calmly tried to give me peace of mind. She explained that the other girls shouldn’t have been so unkind to me.

  “That’s not the right way to treat people,” she explained. “Just because those girls have more knowledge than you do doesn’t mean you are less worthy or i
mportant.”

  Mom wiped away a tear from my cheek. “You can have your own way of dealing with God, and it’s okay if you deal with him differently from the other kids.”

  Though Mom was sensitive to the fact that I wanted to start attending church more regularly, she was never the type of person who let others dictate how she raised me.

  So my lunchroom conversation didn’t suddenly cause us to start going to Sunday school, and I wouldn’t soon be rattling off the books of the Bible. However, both Mom and I learned a lot that day. She learned that religious instruction wasn’t passed on to children automatically, and I learned that I really wanted to know more about God. Of course, part of this was because I wanted to be able to participate in the lunchroom conversations with my friends. But I also had a deep desire to understand God’s character. Instead of counting sheep, I secretly wondered about him as I lay in bed at night.

  As nice as those Easter services were, I knew I wanted more.

  Lesson I’ve Learned

  You can work hard and still have fun. You’re more likely to stick with something if you find it both challenging and enjoyable. Fortunately, my coaches and parents understood that, and they never had to push me to practice. I found gymnastics so rewarding that I pushed myself.

  Chapter 3

  Just a Normal Girl

  Life is a series of thousands of tiny miracles.

  —Mike Greenberg

  “SHAWN, YOU NEED to do your homework.”

  Startled, I looked up to see my math teacher standing over me.

  “I finished it.”

  “Well, then,” she said with a slight smile, “do tomorrow’s assignment.”

  “I finished that, too.”

  “You finished tomorrow’s homework?” I guess she didn’t know what to say next, because she just shook her head and walked away.

  What I didn’t tell her was that I’d finished my math homework for the entire month. I had a syllabus with the upcoming assignments and had worked ahead. Math came easily to me, but more important, I’d learned early on that I had to be as disciplined about finding time to finish homework as I was about training in the gym.

  By second grade, I went to Chow’s after school from about 4:30 to 8:30 every weeknight. That meant once I got home from school, I’d have a quick snack and change into my leotard before my mom drove me to the gym. If I had homework, I had to finish it when I came home in the evening. Because I wanted to do well at both school and gymnastics, I was multitasking before I’d even heard the word.

  That didn’t mean every day was easy, though. Sometimes I didn’t get enough rest, and once in a while I had a meltdown on my way home from practice. Over time, my parents devised a routine to help me cope. When I got home from the gym at the end of a tough day, my dad would make me homemade French toast, using real butter and Wonder bread. It was my absolute favorite. After we ate together, we’d watch TV. I’d sit next to my mom, who’d give me a back rub.

  No matter what kind of day I’d had, I could count on Dude running toward me, tail wagging, as soon as I walked in from school or from practice. He expected nothing from me except my companionship. Perhaps that’s one reason my family’s dogs have always been so important to me.

  One day when I was in fourth grade, my dad showed up at school and signed me out. When we were in his truck, he explained that Dude’s veterinarian had had to put him to sleep. I knew that Dude had been very sick, but I was crushed. My dad took me out to lunch so we could talk and cry together. Then he let me stay home from school for the rest of the day. Over the next week, the house seemed much too quiet. We all hated coming home without Dude to greet us at the door.

  About two weeks later, I walked into my dad’s home office and saw him and my mom looking at something on the Internet. It turned out they were searching for a new dog. Worried that I might assume they were trying to replace Dude—something we all knew was impossible—they asked me, “Shawn, how would you feel about adopting another dog?”

  A few days later we drove to Nevada, Iowa, a small town just east of Ames. A couple there had recently adopted two puppies and then discovered the wife was pregnant with twins. The thought of raising four “babies” seemed like too much, so they posted an ad on the Internet seeking homes for their two golden retriever puppies. As soon as we walked into their house, one of the puppies caught my eye. Not long after, I carried him in my arms to the car. Tucker has been my baby ever since. When I was younger, I let him chase me as I rode my scooter; once I got my driver’s license, I started taking him through the McDonald’s drive-through for a small cup of ice cream or to Starbucks for a doggy latte.

  Losing Dude was tough, and as my parents knew, it took me a while to sort out my feelings of sadness. I’ve always been a deep thinker, but I’ve never been good at sharing my thoughts, opinions, and feelings out loud. I think that’s one reason I began writing poetry—it allowed me to make sense of what I was feeling. When I was in second grade, three pieces I wrote were included in an anthology of poetry and short stories written by Iowa schoolchildren. I still remember how proud I was when I got to read them aloud in a local chocolate shop.

  When I was in seventh grade, my teacher had us write a poem about ourselves. This was a dream assignment for me, and I took weeks getting the words just right. My classmates, most of whom submitted poems with titles like “A Cool Guy Who Likes Girls,” were baffled by my poem, which I called “A Caring Girl Who Loves to Flip.” When I read it today, I’m amazed at how my basic outlook on life hasn’t changed all that much. The poem ends this way:

  I understand that nothing is easy.

  I say everything happens for a reason.

  I dream of one day the world is in peace.

  I try to see the good in everything.

  I am a caring girl who loves to flip.

  I started writing in a journal in elementary school. That’s where I jotted down some of my poetry; it’s also where I wrote inspirational quotes. Sometimes while reading I’d come across a sentence that stopped me short and made me think, That’s just how I feel! Whenever I had that reaction, I jotted down the quote in a journal. I’ve always loved to draw, too, and my early journals are filled with drawings of hearts and rainbows. Gymnastics required intense focus much of the time; journaling and drawing provided a release and a much-needed break from that, at least briefly.

  Looking back, I realize that my parents maintained an incredible balancing act: they supported me wholeheartedly in gymnastics, which I loved, but they also worked hard to keep my life as normal as possible. That meant I went to public school rather than being homeschooled. When I expressed interest in joining the track team with some friends during middle school, my parents encouraged me to go out for it. I had a blast doing the high jump and the long jump and running sprints. Eventually, though, my track coaches wanted me to devote more hours to the sport, which was impossible given my gymnastics schedule. That ended my track career, though not my love of it. I got to be a part of class activities, too, like dancing in my elementary school’s production of 100 Years of Broadway.

  My mom and dad knew how to keep me grounded. They recognized my talent and drive for gymnastics, yet they reminded me that everyone is special at something. My mom and I spent a lot of time driving to and from the gym, but we also enjoyed unwinding by scrapbooking and shopping together.

  Gymnastics was never my whole life, but it was always my passion. The gym was like my playground. I loved growing up wearing a leotard. I loved the daily repetition of the movements that reinforced my skills on the balance beam. I loved conditioning every day, with all of my friends neatly in rows, walking, flipping, and stretching our bodies to increase our already improbable flexibility. I loved competing against my friends as well as against myself. I loved what it felt like to finally try out a move on the beam after practicing on a line on the floor for weeks. I loved getting back on the bars after falling. I loved flying through the air.

  Practice began wit
h at least thirty minutes to an hour of conditioning, stretching, and endurance training. For strength training, my teammates and I did push-ups, sit-ups, squat jumps, and pull-ups. I then spent about fifty minutes working on each event—balance beam, floor exercise, vault, and uneven bars. Coach Chow trained me in vault, bars, and the tumbling elements of my floor routines. Coach Li worked with me on the balance beam and the dance component of my floor routine. Mats and foam pits under each apparatus allow gymnasts to practice new moves safely. But my coaches also never let me do something they didn’t feel I was ready to do without hurting myself.

  Every three months, Chow and Li evaluated their students to see whether they were ready to move up to the next level. Gradually but steadily I advanced. Every level of recreational gymnastics requires a new set of skills, each building on the previous ones. Chow and Li had coaching down to an art—they knew exactly how hard to push me. In turn, I wanted to work as hard as I could to become the best that I could be. I was usually the last athlete to leave the gym each evening, simply because I always wanted one more chance to get a skill right.

  I was lucky to enroll at Chow’s shortly after it opened. That meant I had Coach Chow and Coach Li’s full attention from the start. They told me I was talented, but more than that, they affirmed my desire to follow their direction and make even the tiniest corrections.

  As former top gymnasts themselves, Chow and Li were masters at the technical side of gymnastics. Equally important, I think, was their ability to train me and their other athletes to prepare mentally for meets. They taught us that competition was just a reflection of our training.

  Mistakes, we learned, were normal. After all, we’re human. But if we prepared well and put in 100 percent while competing, our chances of making mistakes went way down. Chow and Li wanted us to work hard and to enjoy the competition experience. Their attitude was always, “You’re here to challenge yourself, but we want you to enjoy your work as well. This is too hard of a sport to stick with if you don’t enjoy it.”