Proud

by Ibtihaj Muhammad

  “Point left!” Jerry cried gesturing toward me. He smiled at me.

  “Good work,” he said.

  “Thank you,” I replied from behind my mask.

  “Ready,” Jerry said, telling us to take our positions. “Fence!” Jerry yelled again and this time I let Angela rush me, which I knew she would, but I blocked her blade with a parry, then hit her with a swift motion to her mask.

  “Point left,” Jerry yelled again. I smiled, knowing no one could see my face behind the mask.

  After a quick match with me scoring all five points, Jerry dismissed Angela, and another girl took her place. She was obviously a better fencer than Angela, but Jerry yelled, “Point”—“Point”—“Point,” all in my favor as I easily took her out, winning all five points again. Jerry said he had one more girl he wanted me to fence—again, me scoring all of the points and the girl walking from the strip just as fast as she’d walked on. Finally, I took my mask off and allowed myself to breathe. Sweat was pouring from my forehead, but I wasn’t tired. I was just getting warmed up. And Jerry wasn’t done with me, either.

  “Brandon, come over here,” he called, and a kid who looked like he could be a high school junior or senior came running over. He was my height and kind of lanky. I sized him up and figured I could take him. I was used to fencing against boys during our school practices so I didn’t even blink. I put my mask back on and assumed my starting position. A small crowd of other coaches had now gathered around to watch me fence with Brandon. Before we could start, though, Jerry called Peter Westbrook himself over, and suddenly my knees felt weak. I was going to fence in front of the legend himself. I didn’t let myself panic, though. I knew I could do this. I waited for the command, and when Jerry yelled, “Fence!” I didn’t wait to see what Brandon was going to do. I started off fast from the on-guard line, accelerating to a fast lunge around Brandon’s premeditated parry. Coach Mustilli called that a number twenty-one. He had numbers for all of the different tactical moves he had taught us, so when we were at a match he could shout a number to us and we’d know what to do. I now planned my bouts in numbers, and used that to my advantage to stay focused. Brandon was a decent opponent but I still bested him, scoring the final winning point. I felt triumphant, but Peter Westbrook wasn’t smiling at my win. He seemed unconvinced of my talents. He had me fight two other boys before taking a break. I beat them both, too. All of the other coaches clapped for me, patted me on the back, and commended me on my skills. But I wanted to hear it from Peter Westbrook himself.

  “Ms. Ibtihaj, I can see Frank Mustilli has taught you well,” Peter said and then, finally, he rewarded me with a smile.

  “Thank you,” I said, panting. I could admit now, I was tired. But I felt good about my performance.

  Peter told me to go back and change and then meet him over by the front desk. When I came from the dressing room, I could feel the strain in my leg muscles, and my right arm ached from the effort. I walked slowly over to where my mother was sitting. Peter was already over there talking with her.

  “So, I was just telling your mother how talented you are,” Peter said.

  “Thank you,” I said. I couldn’t believe Peter Westbrook was calling me talented.

  “Here’s what we’re going to do,” he said. “We have about two hundred students coming in here every Saturday for fencing lessons, but Ibtihaj here is beyond that. Frank’s doing well with her. We’d like to have her join our elite group of students who come in to train after school. You have to promise to work hard, and in exchange we’ll waive your membership fee, we’ll give you your own locker, and when we think you’re ready, we can help with the funding for tournament expenses. How does that sound to you all?”

  “That sounds good,” my mom said. “But will she be working with you directly, Mr. Westbrook?”

  “Ms. Muhammad,” Peter Westbrook said, focusing all of his attention on my mom. “I’m here every single day on the floor with all the kids. Ibtihaj will have her own special coach, but yes, I will be overseeing everything that goes on here. Nothing happens here without my say-so.”

  My mom seemed satisfied with that answer, and I was, too. The energy that filled that room was palpable, and I wanted to be a part of it, to fence with other athletes of color and learn from Olympians and Olympic hopefuls alike.

  “That sounds like a good deal,” mom said, and then she turned to me. “What do you think?”

  “I think it sounds great,” I said. I felt like I’d just won a prize. I knew joining the Peter Westbrook Foundation could help me achieve my goal of landing a fencing scholarship for college, but also, it would help me develop into a better fencer, ensuring better results during competitions. The memory of my Junior Olympics performance still made me cringe. That was an experience I never wanted to repeat. So I shook Peter’s hand and officially became a Foundation fencer.

  I started training at the Westbrook Foundation during the summer before my senior year. At the foundation, we were treated like athletes, not students. There was no babying or hand-holding. From the moment we walked inside the door, we were expected to be respectful athletes, and we could expect the same respect from the coaches.

  Every day the routine was pretty standard. Upon arrival, I would join the group class where we would do footwork and drills. We would spend a lot of time working on our technique, practicing a series of footwork or a particular move over and over again, so at game time, we would instinctively be able to execute. Once class ended, after about an hour and a half, we would have open or free fencing, during which time everyone would also take individual lessons with their personal coach. Every once in a while, mostly on Wednesday nights, Peter would come and watch us fence.

  Peter was a manic ball of energy and would walk around praising a well-executed attack or correcting a failed attempt to score. Sometimes he’d interrupt a bout and push one fencer to the side so he could demonstrate exactly how an action was done. Even at fifty years old, Peter was still an exceptional fencer, exhibiting the fastest hand work I had ever seen. And he loved to deliver lectures or sermons about life while he was with us. Peter always had a Bible verse or life lesson to apply to fencing, and his loud, booming voice could always be heard above the sounds in the cavernous fencing club.

  I loved the atmosphere at the foundation. I felt like I was spending time with my family when I was there. I quickly made friends with the other fencers, and when we weren’t fencing against each other, we would be laughing, enjoying one another’s company, and making fun of each other in jest. Sometimes I fantasized about going to college at New York University, just so I could keep fencing at the foundation and maybe even work there on Saturdays as an instructor, to give back to the community and follow in Peter’s footsteps.

  When school started back up in the fall, however, my affection for the foundation grew harder to maintain. My schedule was brutal. College applications were due. The pressures to perform at the highest level in sports and academics were higher. In addition to maintaining an A average, taking all honors and AP classes, and playing on the volleyball and fencing teams, I had to go to the foundation three days a week, plus Saturdays. My schedule was nonstop.

  During the fall when I played volleyball, I still had fencing practice in New York City at the foundation. My mom was like superwoman, able to work a full-time job, get home in time to make dinner, then pick me up from practice a bit early, just in time to take the 5:40 p.m. train into Manhattan. Mom would also pack my meal in a Tupperware container so I could eat my dinner on the train, and once I got to the club, I would take a lesson, free fence for a bit, then catch the 8:50 p.m. train back home. Even though I’d want to do nothing more than fall asleep on that train, usually I’d take advantage of the forty-minute ride to study.

  It was a nutty schedule, but I’d made a commitment to myself to become a better fencer. That didn’t mean I was willing to give up anything else in my life to achieve that goal. Not when I was so close to graduation. I knew my hec
tic schedule wasn’t going to last forever, and playing volleyball had its purpose in my plans to get into college just as much as fencing did. I didn’t expect or want a volleyball scholarship, I simply wanted to prove to colleges that I was well rounded and could handle sports and academics year-round. Plus, I really enjoyed volleyball. Not only were some of my closest friends on the team, I had made a commitment to my teammates, and I wasn’t going to quit on them. I told my parents if my grades dropped or it felt like too much I would slow down, but it never got to that point for me. I maintained my A average, and my fast-paced lifestyle became the norm.

  Even when Ramadan arrived during the season and I had to play volleyball and fence while fasting from sunrise to sunset, abstaining from food and water, I still didn’t want to quit. The truth was, I really enjoyed playing sports, and I liked the opportunity they provided to spend time with my friends. Not only did we practice after school, but even during the summers we were together for camps and tournaments. The way I looked at it, giving up either volleyball or fencing would mean giving up not only an opportunity to develop my athletic abilities, but also my primary opportunity to socialize. I didn’t go to parties or have time in my schedule to “hang out,” so playing team sports was not going to get cut from my agenda. I was willing to put in the hard work and executive-level time management skills in order to fit it all in.

  As a senior, for the second year in a row I was captain of the fencing team, and we continued defending our state champion status. Fall sports previews had us repeat state champions and as Coach Mustilli had predicted, I was now one of the best saber fencers in the state. In February, I qualified for the Junior Olympics. This time the competition was in Colorado, and I had much higher hopes than how I fared the year before. I flew to the competition with fencing friends from other local high schools and the foundation. It was the first time I had been out of the state on my own, and it felt like I was really part of something important. I finished in the top thirty-two, but a blizzard hit the same day we were due to fly home, so we were stuck in Colorado for three days. While I knew my family was worried about me back in New Jersey, my friends and I loved living in a five-star hotel watching the winter wonderland from our windows and pretending school and fencing practice and college applications weren’t going to be waiting for us when we returned.

  The craziness of my life as a top student-athlete became my new normal. My day-to-day life indeed felt like a car ride where my foot always had to be firmly pressed down on the gas, but I had gotten used to the speed. My parents had instilled in me a strong work ethic and a nothing-but-the-best mentality. They had me convinced that if I was willing to work for it, anything was possible. For me, that “anything” meant getting an acceptance letter to an Ivy League university.

  My mom and dad were good as their word, too. They demanded excellence, but they created a life for us where we could focus 100 percent on our studies and sports. They didn’t make us get after-school jobs. Other than our chores in the house, we had all the time we needed for our homework and sports practice. And my mom was a soccer mom times ten, always picking up someone from practice, dropping someone else off, fixing a uniform, or cheering someone on from the sidelines. I would have felt guilty if I didn’t give maximum effort, considering how hard my parents worked for us. And it wasn’t only me that needed my parents’ support.

  Even though my brother Qareeb was the apple of my eye, watching him begin the college application process was a lesson for me in what not to do. If it weren’t for my mom, he would have missed a bunch of deadlines and fallen behind in the whole process. My mom had to help him get up to speed.

  “Mom, isn’t Qareeb supposed to be doing this by himself?” I asked as the two of them sat at the kitchen table, heads bent over a piece of paper I assumed was an application.

  My brother shot me a look across the room.

  Getting straight A’s wasn’t on Qareeb’s bucket list, despite my parents’ best efforts. He was super smart, but he wanted to live his life on his own terms. I turned to leave the kitchen knowing I wasn’t needed, but I couldn’t help offering my mom a small bit of consolation on my way out of the room. “Just so you know, Mom, I’ll do all of my college and scholarship applications by myself.”

  “I know you will, Ibtihaj,” my mom called after me. “I know I can always count on you to do the right thing.”

  “She only got into Duke because she’s Black.” I heard Heather Clark and her two best friends talking about me as I walked behind the three of them in the hallway. I knew they were talking about me, because I was the only person from my graduating class—Black or white—going to Duke University in the fall. Jenny Murphy had been waitlisted. The guidance counselor put my name and Duke together on the bulletin board outside her office with the other students who were on their way to college. Ultimately, Duke beat out NYU and Columbia as my top choice because Duke offered me the most money in academic scholarship funding and they recruited me to be on their fencing team. I wasn’t sold on going so far away from home for college—living in New Jersey, I just assumed I’d land somewhere in the Northeast—but I couldn’t turn down an amazing opportunity even if it did mean going to school below the Mason-Dixon line, a line I was a little bit hesitant to cross as an African-American hijabi. I didn’t know what kind of welcome I’d receive in North Carolina, but I figured on Duke’s campus I’d be in a safe environment where I would surely be able to find my “people.” After hearing what Heather and her friends were saying about me, I felt a twinge of anger. My scholarship wasn’t a handout. I’d worked my butt off to get good grades and become a nationally ranked fencer. I’d sacrificed a social life, free time, and my summers to make myself a well-rounded student who would be accepted into an elite university. And yet Heather and her friends wanted to make me seem inferior, like somehow I wasn’t actually qualified to gain admittance into a prestigious university.

  As I walked up and down the hallway that week, I was full of fire inside. I debated whether it would be worth it to let Heather and her friends know that I had earned the right to go to Duke with excellent grades in honors and advanced placement classes and being the captain of the fencing team. My admittance essay was about how I didn’t let my race or religion stop me from getting ahead in a world that wasn’t kind to people who looked or worshipped like me. As much as I wanted to educate those girls about my reality, I knew it wasn’t worth arguing with ignorance. No matter what I said to Heather and her entourage, they would still walk away thinking it was my race and not my high school record that got me into college.

  Heather Clark wasn’t the only person who gave me grief about going to Duke. My fencing family at the Westbrook Foundation had their own plans for me. They wanted me to stay in the tri-state area for college so I could continue training at the club. Even though I had gotten into NYU, Peter’s alma mater, the financial aid they offered wasn’t enough to compete with Duke. I promised Peter that I would keep up my training at Duke and planned to come home during all of my school breaks to train at the foundation. I’d continue to take as many classes as they wanted me to, but they still weren’t thrilled with my decision.

  The truth was, I was looking forward to taking a break from the foundation for a bit, because things weren’t as perfect as they originally seemed.

  When I first heard that Sam was going to be my coach, I was excited. Not only was Sam a United States Olympian around the same age as Peter, he was also Black and a Muslim like me. I thought we would have a lot in common and hoped we’d have a real connection, but from day one, something was off. I’d met him briefly at the movie premiere of Peter’s documentary and he’d been drinking a beer at the time. As a sixteen-year-old, I didn’t understand how Sam could consider himself a Muslim and drink alcohol. It made me uneasy, which might have made me seem hesitant at first when I was around him. Whatever it was, we definitely got off on the wrong foot. Maybe Sam felt uncomfortable around me because I wore hijab and he was a less conser
vative Muslim. Maybe he just didn’t like my personality. Whatever the reason, I never knew what type of mood he’d be in when I came to practice. He was the one dark spot in my experience at the foundation.

  I remember one day I walked into practice, and apparently I had upset Sam before I could even open my mouth. I came out of the locker room ready to work, and Sam gave me an irritated look.

  “You didn’t say hi to me when you came in, so you can go home and try again tomorrow,” he said. “Go home,” he repeated, turning his back on me.

  I was shocked and confused. I knew from past experiences not to question Sam because that would make him more upset. So I went back into the locker room, got dressed and headed for the door. When Peter saw me in my street clothes he stopped me.

  “Where are you going, Ibtihaj?” he asked.

  I told him what Sam had said.

  “Go get changed. You’re staying right here for your lesson. I’ll talk to Sam.” And so, for the second time in less than fifteen minutes, I headed back to the locker room and got ready for practice.

  These kinds of bizarre mind games were commonplace working with Sam. I wasn’t the only one who dealt with his erratic behavior. One day Sam sent two girls home from practice, telling them they had gained weight and not to come back until they lost ten pounds. Another time he told me not to come to practice unless I brought him a fifty-dollar box of Titleist golf balls. When I complained to some of the other coaches at the foundation about Sam’s behavior, nothing seemed to change, so I stopped complaining. I just did my best not to provoke his ire. My parents had some idea about Sam’s odd behavior, but I didn’t tell them everything because I didn’t want to give them any reason to stop sending me to the foundation. I was confused. I was young and inexperienced, and my coach was an Olympian. I didn’t have any power in our coach-pupil dynamic. I knew at the foundation I was part of one of the best fencing programs in the tri-state area and receiving excellent training in a sport I had grown to love. I always told myself that since my lessons with Sam were usually only thirty minutes out of a two-hour practice, I could suck up the abuse. My teammates at the foundation had turned into family, and Peter Westbrook himself had become a mentor to me. I didn’t want to lose all of that. But most days after working with Sam, now that college was in sight, I found myself planning my escape.