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LAST WEEK, in Part I of Oliver Butterworth's "Orrie's Run":
On her 12th birthday, Orrie is challenged by her aunt to do something special. Orrie decides to start a secret running plan - to wake up before her parents and brother Henry and run along the Housatonic River, then sneak back into bed before breakfast. One morning, in the nearby Indian graveyard, Orrie meets an old Indian woman named Namowa, who offers her some advice: She might run faster if she holds her head up high. Sure enough, when Orrie is approached by classmates to run on the girls' relay team in a contest against the boys, she helps the team win in record time. The boys aren't happy, but they recognize a secret weapon when they see one, and recruit Orrie to run on the boys' track team against rival New Milford - disguised as relay team member Willy Hanrahan. When it is discovered that Orrie was the speedster who led the team to victory, her principal, Mr. Finley, and a regional track coach, Mr. Schnell, encourage Orrie to run in the Interscholastics meet against older high school girls statewide. Part II begins as the gun is about to go off for the first round of trial heats at the Interscholastics.
I started as fast as I could, but they were all ahead of me by a couple of steps, so as usual I had to catch up. By the time I was around the first turn, I had passed most of them, and in the straight part I passed the leaders, and there I was. Everybody was behind me, and I suddenly felt I had to stop. Just like that. Right in the middle of the race. I let them all run past me, and then I started running again, and I worked my way past all those swinging arms and pounding legs and kept my head up and looked up high in the air and I felt like I was floating - just floating right to the finish line.
And then there was a lot of yelling and people pushing, and they looked at me as if I was crazy. I didn't know what Mr. Schnell would say. Photographers were taking pictures and news people gathered around and asked questions. What did you stop for? Was something the matter? Did your coach tell you to do that? Who is your coach? Were you trying to lose? Were you trying to throw the race, so someone else could win?
I just shook my head and held out my hands. I didn't know why I had stopped. I just did. I couldn't explain it, even to myself.
When we got on the bus, I got a seat next to the window. When Irwin came down the aisle, he sat next to me. That made me feel good, because I didn't think any of these high schoolers would want to sit next to an elementary school kid, and that I would sit there alone, as if I had some horrible disease.
"Hello, Orrie," Irwin said. "Mind if I sit here?"
"No," I said. "I'd like it." Then I felt a little embarrassed, because that sounded too forward, so I asked him how he'd done in the meet.
"Fair," he said. "I was in the eight hundred meter relay, and we came in second in our heat, so we qualify for the finals." Then he turned and looked right at me. "And you, Orrie - I hear that you won your heat in the two hundred. How about that now!"
I felt a little shiver go down my backbone, and I felt my face get all warm, but he didn't seem to notice.
"Now we'll both have sleepless nights," he said, "worrying about the races tomorrow. But with times like yours, you probably don't worry about races. You were only 22 seconds today, and that's close to the women's record. And you stopped in the middle of the race! Why did you do that, anyway?"
"I don't know," I told him. "I didn't mean to do it. It just happened. I think maybe it was because I got the feeling from Mr. Schnell that he didn't want me to run too fast today, as if he wanted to save me for tomorrow."
"That's the way coaches are," Irwin said. "They're always planning and thinking and arranging. After all, since they can't do the running themselves, they try to do everything else. You know, some coaches try to keep their best runners from being known to the other runners, so teams won't gang up on them and try strategies on them."
"Strategies?" I said.
"You know, like tempting a runner to go too fast at first, by having someone run ahead, and things like that. They'll probably try tricks like that on you tomorrow, now that they've gotten to know you. Coaches really want their teams to win."
I looked at him. "Everybody wants to win, don't they?"
"I guess so," he said. "But, Orrie, you don't seem so eager to win. I get the feeling that you'd almost rather not. Why is that?"
"I don't know. Sometimes I feel that beating everybody else is the greatest thing in the world. It makes me feel like a super person - like the king of the castle. I mean, the queen of the castle. And then other times I think that's not what I want, really. What I want most is to be friends with people, so we can talk together, live together, and tell the truth to each other. And not have to try to win against other people."
By this time, the bus had stopped at Albertus Magnus, and everyone stood up. Irwin looked down at me as we waited to go down the aisle. "You know, Orrie, I think you're going to be a philosopher when you grow up. After you win all your races. Good luck tomorrow."
"You too," I said to him.
When I got up to my room, Astrid and Robin were already there, and they looked at me with much more interest than before.
"You won your race, Orrie!" Astrid said. "Nice going!"
"And you stopped in the middle of it!" Robin said.
Robin said she had never seen anyone do that before. She wondered if I stopped so the other girls would have a chance to win. She said that Indian women liked to do things together, and sometimes even liked to finish a race all together, as if everybody won, and nobody lost.
"I don't know. Sometimes I feel so proud when I do it all by myself," Robin said. "Like today, another girl and I tied for the best high jump. I was proud of that, but I wished I didn't have to share a tie with someone else - so I could be really number one."
She looked so proud and dignified with her dark eyes and high cheekbones, that I imagined her as an Indian princess. Astrid smiled at her. "That doesn't sound like winning all together."
"I know," Robin said. "But that's just what I think part of the time. Other times I feel that being tied with another high jumper means that there are two of us who can be number one - so both of us can be proud. Why not?"
"Because," Astrid said, "if you're the only one who wins, then you're the winner, and you can be even prouder. It's like saying, `Mirror, mirror, on the wall, Who is the highest jumper of all?' and the mirror says, `You are.'"
Astrid and Robin asked me to sit at their table for supper. Irwin stopped by and told my roommates to make sure I had a good sleep, because I was championship potential.
"We'll take good care of her," they said.
"That's Irwin Russell, from Hall High in West Hartford. He's their track star and team captain. I hear all the girls in West Hartford are in love with him. And he knows about you, Orrie!'
"He's a nice guy," I said. "I like him."
"You and everybody else," said Astrid.
After supper everybody sat around and talked in the student lounge. Some of them watched TV, but mostly they talked kind of nervously. Astrid and Robin kept me close, and introduced me to some of the group they were with.
Most people were nice, but I could hear others going by saying things like, "She's from Bulls Bridge, wherever that is," and "Yeah, right in the middle of the race." Someone behind me said, "My roommate's from New Milford, and she's seen that girl before. She said she didn't think she was showing off - it was more like she was confused. After all, she's only twelve."
Later on, Astrid and Robin leaned over to me. Astrid said, "You know, Orrie, Irwin told us to see that you have a good sleep. It's about nine o'clock now, and we think you ought to go off to bed. We're all supposed to be in by 9:30, but you can get a head start. We'll come in very quietly, so as not to wake you up. O.K.?"
I went up to our room, but didn't go to sleep right away. I was still awake when Robin and Astrid came creeping in, but I pretended to be asleep. They didn't turn on the light, and fumbled around in the dark. I heard one of them whisper, "You know, she could be the state champion." And the other one whispered back, "And more than that."
I wondered what would be more than that, and I guess I fell asleep wondering.
"Six thirty! Time to get up. Breakfast in half an hour. Are you awake in there?"
"Yes," we all said in chorus, and started kicking off the covers.
At breakfast, everyone was pretty quiet. One girl leaned over and asked, "Is that the famous millet? Could I have a taste?"
I opened up the bag and showed it to her. Her friend said, "I wouldn't eat that, Ethel. This isn't a good time to change your diet."
"Well, one grain of millet isn't going to hurt me." She picked up a kernel of millet, and put it in her mouth. She chewed it slowly. "Hmm," she said. "It tastes like theme paper. Now just watch me run today!" They giggled.
During the morning, there were a lot of semifinals. I saw Astrid's relay team come in second in the four-by-two-hundred relay, so I knew she would be in the finals that afternoon. Robin was going to be in the finals of the high jump. My finals in the two hundred were going to be at one o'clock, so I wasn't supposed to eat much lunch.
At quarter of one I went over to the start and did some stretching exercises. Mr. Schnell talked to me about not worrying at the start, because I always had a slow start and then caught up. "Just be sure to stay right in the middle of your lane, and watch out for elbows as you pass people. Don't let them scare you by having someone go way out in front. There are some good runners here, but not as good as you are. O.K., Orrie? And good luck."
We lined up, and I was in about the middle lane. The other girls were all a lot taller than me, and they looked very determined. I wasn't really ready when the gun went off, so everybody was ahead of me, as usual. I remembered to hold my head up, so pretty soon I was even with the rest of the girls. They were all pretty fast, though, and I still hadn't passed them by the first turn. For the first time, I thought I might not win. I lifted my head up a little higher. On the straightway, I began to pass some of the others, and I watched their elbows - which did stick out pretty far - and then I was out in front! I couldn't see anyone out of the corners of my eyes. I raised my head higher, and there was the finish. Mr. Schnell looked very happy, and after a while my mother and father found me and hugged me. While we celebrated, a man with an official cap came up, and said his name was Ben Boles, and that he was the director of the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Association. He had a broad, tanned face, and his eyes crinkled up when he smiled.
"This must be Orrie Gilbert," he said, "and I guess you are her parents. Congratulations, Orrie, for winning the championship in the two hundred. The Interscholastic Committee has heard a lot about you, and they asked me to suggest an idea to you and your parents."
"Yes?" my father said.
"Well, for some time we have been considering having some coed sports events, like mixed doubles in tennis, or boy-versus-girl tennis matches, in non-contact sports, where size and weight don't give much advantage."
"Good idea," my mother said.
"Now, the Interscholastic Committee thought that if we allowed Orrie to run in the boys' two hundred meter race this afternoon, and if the boys are willing to have her compete, it would be a fine way of furthering coed events in the future. Would you be willing to have Orrie take part in the race?"
"But Orrie's just finished one race," my father said.
The director held up his hand. "Oh, don't worry, Mr. Gilbert. The boys' two hundred is not until four o'clock, so Orrie has almost three hours to rest up. And of course, we wouldn't want to do this unless Orrie is willing."
"What do you think, Orrie?" my mother said.
What I thought was that Irwin wouldn't be in the two hundred, and that was a big relief to me. What I said was that I could try running in the boys' race. "I've never run against high school boys before."
Mr. Boles smiled. "I've talked with the coaches about it, Orrie, and they said it would be O.K. if you joined them as a guest runner. They said the boys wouldn't want to say no, because then it would look as if they were afraid."
"Afraid of me?" I said.
"Afraid of being beaten by you."
"But what if they all beat me," I said, "and I come in last. Won't I look pretty silly?"
He shook his head. "Don't worry about it, Orrie. You're the state champion in the women's two hundred meters, and whatever you do in the boys' race won't change that. Everybody will see that you're a good sport for joining in, and that will help us introduce more coed sports next time."
"Well," I said, "If nobody's going to mind too much, maybe it would be all right."
Mr. Schnell patted me on the back. "That's the way, Orrie," he said. "After today, Orrie Gilbert will be a household name all over the state."
My mother and father took me over to their car and had me lie down on the back seat and rest, while they read the paper in front. I told them to be sure and wake me up by 3:30, so I'd have time to be wide awake before the race. I must have been a bit worried about running with those big high school guys, because I dreamed I was a pygmy in a race with giants, and I was trying not to get stepped on.
"How would you feel if you didn't come in first?" Pop asked me, after they woke me up.
"I don't know," I said. "Maybe this time I'll find out."
He looked at me for a little while. "You haven't ever lost a race, have you, Orrie?" he said. "Would you be terribly disappointed?"
"Don't worry about her, Tom," my mom said. "She's not an all-or-nothing person. She doesn't have to win, the way some people do."
"I agree with you there," Pop said, "but she hasn't had any practice losing, so it might surprise her a bit."
The announcer's voice boomed over the loudspeakers. "The finals of the boys' two hundred meters will be in five minutes. All contestants report to the starting line. By special invitation, Orrie Gilbert, the winner of the girls' two hundred meter, will compete as a guest runner in this event."
I was in the far right lane, and as I looked along the line, I felt awfully small. They all were much bigger than me. I could see they were looking at me sideways, as if they thought having me run in their race wasn't all that great. I was pretty sure that it wasn't their idea.
"On your mark?" the starter called out. They all crouched down on their blocks, looking tense and stiff.
"Get set!" Everything was quiet.
Then there was the pistol shot. They all zoomed out ahead of me, and I thought I'll never catch up to them now. I lifted my head and ran, chasing them along the track. At first, it looked as if I couldn't gain on them at all. I began to think now I would find out what it feels like to lose. I knew north lay up toward the turn, and I looked that way with my head held up the way Namowa said. I was getting closer to the boys. By the time I rounded the turn I was up to them, with their big elbows swinging back and forth. I kept my arms close to my sides, slipped through the elbows and then I was past them and no one was in front of me. I could hear the pounding of feet and the breathing behind me and then suddenly there was the tape, and it hit me right on the neck. It was over.
For about three seconds, there wasn't any sound. Then there was a big roar from the stands. The noise went on for a while, and one of the boys came over to me, his chest still heaving, and shook my hand. Then some other boys came over and shook hands with me, and finally the last three boys wandered over, looking sort of uncertain about the whole thing.
The stands began to quiet down, and you could hear a few shouts, like, "What's the matter, you guys?" and, "Pansies!" There were even a few boos from the far end of the stands. Then the announcer's voice called out, "The winner of the two hundred meters: Orrie Gilbert, in the time of 19.2 seconds." There was a short pause. "This is a new world record for the two hundred meters, one half-second faster than the old record, set in 1979."
The boys looked at each other, smiled, and slapped each other on the back, and I walked over to the stands to find my parents. There were two men in front of me, and I heard one of them say, "Well, you know, the two hundred meters is more of a women's race really. They're beginning to drop it from the men's events. It's too short to make a good race."
I found Mom and Pop in front of the stands, and they both hugged me hard. "Orrie, you've done more for coed sports today than the whole women's movement since Susan B. Anthony," said Mom.
"You know, your way of running a race is enough to scare your parents to death," Dad said, with a smile. "I try not to look until you're halfway around the track. But I do peek, I have to admit."
We walked over to where Mr. Schnell was talking to other coaches. They were all congratulating him and looking kind of envious.
"And Orrie," Mr. Schnell said, "I'd like to go up to Kent to talk over your next plans. How about next Sunday, a week from tomorrow? The NCAA games are in Cincinnati at the end of the month, and I think we can get you in as a special contestant." Mr. Schnell looked eager.
"Well," Pop said, "We can talk about it on Sunday."
I didn't say anything then, but on the way home, I asked, "Are there going to be more track meets all summer?"
"Are you getting tired of track meets?" Mom said.
"Well, there are other things to do."
Mom looked at me. "More exciting than winning races?"
"Not more exciting, probably. But more important."
"More important?" Mom said. "More important than what you've done for women's sports and coed events?"
My father cleared his throat. "Let's give Orrie a chance to rest up from this track meet before we plan the next one. We ought to think about Henry's plans a little. He and Beaver Murphy want to row on the river after school is over for the summer. They think they can borrow Mr. Wells' shell up at the Kent School boathouse."
The next morning I ran up to the Indian reservation and saw Namowa sitting on the stone wall by the burial ground.
"I hear you have broken a world record, Orrie," Namowa said. She looked at me closely. "Did the boys push you pretty hard?"
"At first I thought I was going to lose," I said. "But I held my head up the way you told me, and I looked toward where I thought Schaghticoke Mountain was, and I began passing them all. I was surprised."
She smiled a little. "I shouldn't think you'd be surprised anymore, Orrie. You've won all the races you've been in."
"Yes," I said, "but I can't always win. Sooner or later, something will happen, and then I'll lose. Maybe the magic will wear off."
"Magic!" Namowa said. "Do you think that holding your head up is magic!"
"Well, maybe not, but it feels that way."
Namowa squinted up her eyes. "You can breathe better that way, Orrie. That's not magic."
"All right, maybe that's not magic, but what about looking toward Schaghticoke Mountain? That wouldn't make me breathe any better, would it?"
"That depends, Orrie. It depends where you're looking at the mountain from. But there's something more important than that. That mountain is where your home is. You belong to it, and it belongs to you. There's a part of you at the foot of that mountain. Maybe I feel that more than you do, because I have lived at the foot of Schaghticoke Mountain for 86 years - all my life. When I die I'm going to be buried at the foot of the mountain, and it will be my home forever, just as it is the home of all my people who have lived here beside this river. Something flows down from the mountain into me, and I can feel it inside, and it helps me do things. And some of it flows into you, and it helps you do things too, probably more than you ever thought you could. Perhaps that's magic, and perhaps it isn't, but it's something strong either way."
I nodded. "It must be strong if it helped me win all those races. I could feel it working in me. It kind of lifted me. When that happened, I felt as if I could do almost anything. That's when it seemed like magic."
"Yes, it does seem like magic," Namowa said. "But there's something I'd like to ask you, Orrie. I read in the newspaper today that your coach, Mr. Schnell, is planning to have you run in the college track meet out in Ohio. Are you going to do that?" She looked straight at me.
I didn't know what to say. I was afraid she was going to ask me that question, and I hadn't figured out what to do. I was pretty sure my mother wanted me to go. I thought my father wasn't too keen about it, but he hadn't said so. Namowa wasn't saying what she thought. She just asked me the question, and looked at me with those deep eyes of hers.
"I don't know," I said. And I didn't know. I never did like having to decide things like this. When you want two different things, why can't you have both?
"Part of me wants to go out to Ohio, Namowa. I would love to win the races out there, and to be famous when I'm only twelve, and have my name in the newspapers, and maybe be on TV. But - "
Namowa smiled a little. "But what, Orrie?"
"But there's something else I want, and I don't know what it is exactly."
"Maybe it isn't anything exactly? Some things that are really important to us aren't quite exact. They can be hard to put into words sometimes. Can you find any words to say what the something else is, Orrie?"
I tried to think of words. "Friends," I said. "Doing things with people ... not just trying to beat them at something."
Namowa nodded. "I understand, Orrie."
"And then," I said, "I see that winning races is only halfway toward what I want. If I could do things with other people where we both win, then we could both feel good and that would be much better. Does that make any sense?"
Namowa smiled some more. "I think it makes sense to you, Orrie. Does that help you decide about going to Ohio?"
"I think it does," I said. "I've made myself feel good by winning races. But it doesn't make me feel good enough. So I think I'll try to feel better still by winning things with people. But I don't know just how to do that. Do you think I could find out?"
Namowa patted the back of my hand. "I can see, Orrie, that you would like to try to find out, and that you think it would be worth doing. Will you be able to decide about going to Ohio?"
I looked her in the eyes and nodded.
"What have you decided, Orrie?"
"I won't go to those races."
"Will you be able to explain this to Mr. Schnell?"
I couldn't help frowning. "I'll have to try my best, I guess. I don't think he'll understand."
"Probably not," Namowa said. "But remember, ideas have races too, and we hope the best ideas win." She pointed at the sun coming over the mountain. "It must be time for you to be getting home for breakfast, Orrie. Your family may be wondering where you are. I like having these talks with you, so come again soon."
I left her sitting on the wall, and ran back home. The family was getting breakfast ready. Henry made the corn muffins, with some coaching from Pop, while Mom made the eggs and bacon. I could see it would be my job to do the dishes.
Pop wanted to tell us about his meeting with the people at Connecticut Light & Power on Friday. He was quite steamed up about it.
"All I wanted to ask them for was permission to try a little paddle wheel experiment in the canal in back of the house to see if it would generate enough electricity to run a few lights without causing any problems to the power company. And to my surprise, they suggested that they lend me three small turbines, so we could see how well they could work in a canal like this. They seemed quite interested in the idea, and told me that they wanted to encourage their electricity users to think up ways of using water power where it would be efficient, even on a small scale, because water is a renewable resource, and is non-polluting."
Henry looked doubtful. "But if everyone who lives near the canal can make their own electricity, won't the power company lose money?"
"On the other hand," Pop said, "if the power company owns the canal they can charge people for using the water in it. That way, they could make more money without having to build more generators. They would like that, wouldn't they?"
"Well, yes," Henry admitted. "If the turbines really worked."
"And what's more," Pop said, "the people at the power company seemed to feel that it would be good public relations if they encouraged customers to try things like this. And you know what? They asked me if Orrie Gilbert was my daughter, and when I said she was, they were more interested than ever. They said Orrie has been in the sports news lately, and a lot of Connecticut people have heard about her. I think they have an idea that if we tried out some home generating experiments, and if people knew that we were Orrie Gilbert's family, that could be good advertising. So we have Orrie to thank for our good luck."
Henry smiled a kind of halfway smile. "I guess just about everybody has heard about Orrie by now. When Beaver Murphy and I talked with Mr. Wells at Kent School about using his double-scull boat on the river, he wasn't sure at first. Then he said, `You're Orrie Gilbert's brother, aren't you?' And when I said yes, he said he was very impressed with Orrie, and that all the people in Kent are proud of her. Then he said if we were very careful with his double-scull, he would let us use it on the river, and we wouldn't have to go over to South Kent to row on the pond there."
"You see," Mom said, "Orrie is helping all of us in one way or another."
Henry wrinkled his nose. "I wish I didn't have to depend on her so much. It's kind of tough when she's so famous and I'm not. Everybody thinks of me as Orrie Gilbert's kid brother."
My Dad patted him on the knee. "That's OK, Henry. Take your time. We can all use a little help at times."
"Yeah, sure," Henry said. "It's great to have the help and all that, but sometimes I'd like to be the one who gives the help, instead of getting it."
Mom smiled at him. "Well, Henry, someday you will be giving the help, and people will thank you for it."
It was June 20 when Mr. Schnell drove up from New Milford to talk with us about "plans" for the summer. I felt very nervous about this, because I still hadn't figured out just how to explain to him why I didn't want to run in the NCAA games. I was beginning to feel sort of selfish about spoiling his fun just because I wasn't keen about more track meets.
We had just been down looking at the river water roaring through the gorge, and were standing in front of the house when Mr. Schnell drove up. He waved at us with a big smile.
"Well, how are the Gilberts today? Is Orrie rested up after her triumph last week?"
"She seems to be," Mom said. "And right now she's enjoying her vacation from track meets."
"Well now," Mr. Schnell said, "Orrie deserves a vacation after doing so well. A world record! Just think of that. And in the meantime, we can be making plans for your next triumph. I've been in touch with the NCAA people, and they said they would have you run as a guest star."
Mom looked doubtful. "Mr. Schnell, do you really think Orrie has a chance against college runners? And these would be the best in the nation, too."
"Remember," Mr. Schnell said, "Orrie holds the world record in the event."
"That's true," Mom admitted, "but I still can't quite believe it."
Mr. Schnell smiled his big smile. "Well, believe it or not, that's what happened, Mrs. Gilbert. And now we ought to talk about some of the details for the NCAA meet. That comes on the 30th of June, just ten days from now, and I imagine you folks would like to go out there with your daughter, since she'll be a lot younger than the other athletes. Now it so happens that CBS called the other day to say that if you are going out to Ohio with Orrie, they would like to put you up in a nearby hotel with free room, board and transportation. How does that sound?"
Mom said it sounded very generous, and Pop wanted to know if that would give CBS exclusive rights to me.
"They would make all the arrangements through me," Mr. Schnell said, "and they would have all the in-depth interviews and background stuff. But of course they couldn't stop the other news people from taking pictures and asking questions on the street and so on."
I was beginning to feel trapped. My father looked over at me. "Maybe we ought to hear what Orrie thinks about all these plans," he said. "She hasn't had a chance to say anything yet."
Now it was my turn, but I didn't know what to say. I felt as if I had gotten on a train, and it started to move, and I wanted to get off before it got going too fast. How was I going to explain? My mother looked as if she'd just love to have us all go out to Cincinnati. Even Henry looked curious. And I was pretty sure Mr. Schnell wouldn't understand me at all.
I looked at them, and then I looked down at the ground.
"Well," I said, "All these plans got going before I even knew if I wanted to go to Cincinnati. I feel as if everybody's deciding everything for me."
Mom patted me on the shoulder. "I know, Orrie. We have sort of pushed you into this, so just take your time and say how you feel about it. After all, you're the star, and if it weren't for you, we wouldn't have this chance at all."
That didn't make it any easier. I sighed. "I guess I should have said right at the start of this intercollegiate thing that I really didn't want to do it, but I didn't know then that I didn't. It was after I thought about it for a while."
"You didn't want to?" Mom said.
"Well," I said, "I did want to at first. It was exciting. It was exciting to see if I could win."
Mr. Schnell pointed at me. "Of course it is, Orrie. That's what sports are all about. To see if we can win."
"But you see," I said, "I began to think that if I went to any more of these races, I would be doing it because other people wanted me to, not because I wanted to. When I'm running in a race, I sometimes think, Why am I doing this? Because I want to beat everybody else? Or because I want to please somebody else who wants me to win?"
"It's because you want to win, Orrie," Mr. Schnell said. "Everybody wants to win. You know that. You've been thinking too much about it."
I shook my head. "Maybe I shouldn't think about it at all. Running races isn't so much fun when you begin to wonder why you're doing it. Anyway, I don't think I ought to be in races when I feel this way."
Mom's lips were pressed together tight. Pop looked back and forth at me and Mr. Schnell. My family seemed embarrassed, and they didn't say anything. Mr. Schnell looked as if he was trying hard to be patient, and then he took a deep breath and started in on me.
"Now Orrie," he said in a slow voice. "We know you're tired after the Interscholastics. We understand that all right. Lots of good athletes feel this way after meets, and it takes them a while to get charged up again. You'll be feeling more like it in a few days, I'm sure."
I shook my head. "I'm not so sure, Mr. Schnell. Running in races was the most fun in the beginning, when it was just a game. Perhaps the most fun of all was when I was pretending to be Willy Hanrahan, and everybody thought it was Willy, and they were all congratulating him, and he was so embarrassed about it. That was really fun. But then it got more and more serious when you got me into the Interscholastics, and then it wasn't a game anymore. That sort of spoiled it."
Mr. Schnell frowned for just a second, then looked pleasant again right away. "Now Orrie," he said, "it is a game, of course, and the higher up you get in the competition, the more important the game gets to be. More and more depends on whether you win, and the stakes get higher. You're very young to be a national champion, of course, but if you were older, you would see how much depends on your winning the top place - money, a career, fame, and all the things that go with that. It's not just the fun, it's the winning that really counts."
My father looked at me with one eyebrow up, as if he was wondering what I thought about all that. Mom opened her mouth as if she was going to say something, but she didn't.
Mr. Schnell looked pretty serious, himself. "That's what it's really all about, Orrie." He crossed his arms on his chest. "That's what life is all about, Orrie. It starts out as fun and games, but then it gets more serious. We're all in this big game together, trying to see who's going to win. And if we win, and win big, then everything comes to us - and that's fun, Orrie. That's real fun.
"Now, you have the good luck to be a natural winner. You discovered the knack of finding your zone, where suddenly everything becomes easy, when everything floats smoothly together, and you become superhuman while you're in that zone." He smiled, then held out his hands, like he was giving me a prize. "The big thing about this is that you're so young. Other people have been national champions, but none so young as you. You're really special, especially lucky. Can't you feel that?"
"Well," I said, "I guess I feel lucky, all right."
Mr. Schnell beamed a big friendly smile at me, and looked around at Mom, Pop and Henry. "And if you're lucky like this, Orrie, you're supposed to use it just the best way you can and not waste it. What if Muhammad Ali decided he didn't want to be a prizefighter? Or if Mark Twain didn't want to write stories? Think what we would lose. People ought to do what they're especially good at. Doesn't that make sense?"
I didn't know what to say. It did make sense, I suppose. I looked down toward the river where it was going over the dam, and I gazed up toward Schaghticoke Mountain. I looked at Henry, Pop and Mom, and they looked at me.
"It's such an opportunity for you, Orrie," Mr. Schnell said. "And for your family, too. It would be a great trip for you all. Cincinnati is an interesting city, right there in a bend of the Ohio River. CBS would put you up in the Westin Hotel, which looks out on Fountain Square. It's only three or four blocks from Riverfront Stadium, on Pete Rose Way, right along the river. The Westin is right next to the Arts Center - but you folks should go across the river on one of the riverboats and visit the MainStrasse Village. That's where they've restored the old town settled by German immigrants. My great-grandparents lived there, and a lot of Schnell relatives still live there. And of course, there's the excitement of Orrie's part in the NCAA games."
He held out his arms to us all. He looked as if he was inviting us all to be his guests out in Cincinnati. How could I say no to that? I began to feel embarrassed.
"Well, gee, Mr. Schnell," I said. "You've done so much for me ... I have to thank you a lot for everything ... but it doesn't seem right for you to spend all this time on me if I'm not sure I want to do it."
"Don't worry about that, Orrie," he said. "You're worth all the time and then some. You're the biggest opportunity that's come my way since I started coaching - and, of course, it's a big opportunity for you. You shouldn't let it slip away."
"But what if I want to do something else? I've won a lot of races already. Maybe there's other things beside that."
He shrugged his shoulders. "Well, you might be able to win other events, of course. You probably could, and we can explore that later on. But right now, you can be champion and know that you're the top, and you can make the most of it while you are a champion. Champions don't last forever, you know. They come and go. Do it while you can, Orrie. Now's your chance, and you'd better take it." He rubbed his hands together.
Henry had been watching Mr. Schnell, looking back and forth between us. Suddenly he said in a pretty loud voice, "What if she just doesn't want to do it? Can't Orrie do what she wants?"
I was so surprised. Henry never talked about me that way before. He was taking my side. He was backing me up. Defending me. I could have hugged him. I looked at him thankfully, and he smiled. I felt close to him.
Mr. Schnell looked hard at Henry and sighed. "Well," he said, "I guess the thing to do for now is to let you folks talk this all over. I think Orrie is tired right now. Let's give her a few days to get rested, and she'll probably feel more like taking you all to Cincinnati for the meet. But you'll have to make your decision within the week, so we can let the NCAA know in time, and tell CBS that you're coming. They're all pretty eager about Orrie, you know. There's never been a twelve-year-old world champion before, and CBS is going to make the most of it, you can be sure of that. A lot of people are going to be terribly disappointed if Orrie doesn't come."
He shook hands with Pop and Mom, but not with Henry, and he walked over to his car. "Goodbye for now. I'll get in touch Friday, so we can make our plans. I think Orrie will be feeling more like it by then. Good luck, everybody."
Well, I had four days before Friday, when I would have to decide if we were going to Cincinnati or not. By now, I was pretty sure I didn't want to go, though I couldn't really explain why. I think it was partly because I wanted to do other things instead, but I didn't have anything special that I wanted to do, except going running up the river road, talking to Namowa, doing things with my family, and just being myself. That doesn't sound all that important, does it?
But then there was the other side of the question. If we didn't go, I would be saying no to Mr. Schnell. He wanted me to be his special track star and be famous. He would be famous too, I guess, and if I say no, he's going to be so disappointed. And what about my family? Mom would really like to have us go. Partly because it would be a great trip, and partly because she wants to have women do things, and not just sit around and watch men do them. That's a good thought, but you still have to decide which things you want to do.
Mom told me that it really had to be my decision, because I was the champion and I would have to do the running. Pop said that it's nice to try to please other people, but I should stand up for my own thoughts, too. Henry said that going to Cincinnati would be fun, but so is rowing on the river here.
So Friday morning I called Mr. Schnell, and told him very politely that I really didn't think I wanted to go. He didn't say anything for a while, and I could imagine how he felt. He had played a game, and he had lost, and losing wasn't any fun.
"Well," he said finally, "I'm sorry you feel this way, Orrie. Perhaps in another couple of years you may change your mind. If you still have your speed, you could still have a great career ahead of you." And he hung up.
For the next few days, Henry and Beaver Murphy were busy on the river. Mr. Wells up at Kent School had planned a mini-regatta for junior rowers, and on July 1 they were going to have a mile-long race down the river. Henry and Beaver knew they weren't all that great as oarsmen, but they were practicing as much as they could. They would bicycle up to Kent, take out Mr. Wells' double-scull shell, put in two pairs of oars, and go rowing down the river, catching crabs every now and then. I used to watch them when they came in sight of our house, down above the dam. They weren't supposed to go too near the dam, because if the water was high, they might get into trouble. They were both good swimmers, so nobody worried about them. Mr. Wells had told them to never, never abandon the boat. If they tipped over, they were to swim the boat ashore, take out the oars, carefully tip the water out of the boat, and get back in again. He really liked to have kids learn to row, because that was his favorite sport, but he would hate to have anything happen to his boat.
The great Housatonic River Mini-Regatta fell on a Thursday. It rained quite a lot Tuesday and Wednesday, and Henry and Beaver complained that they didn't have decent weather to practice in. "Maybe we should have gone out to Cincinnati after all," Henry said. "They've probably got nice weather for the track meet out there. And Orrie could be winning all those races, while we're getting rained on."
But Wednesday afternoon it cleared up a bit, so the boys went up to Kent to get in their last practice. I said I would run up the river road to watch them as they came past the Indian reservation. As I crossed over the covered bridge, I could see that the Housatonic was really high. The water was just pouring over both dams in great white waves and foaming downstream. I thought of all the electricity those turbines from CL&P would generate if they were in the river now. And then I thought what would happen to a boat if it went over the dam - and what if two boys were in the boat?
I hurried along the road so I could warn Henry and Beaver not to come any farther down the river. I got as far as the waterfall that comes down the cliff when I caught sight of the boys - but they weren't in their boat. Something was wrong. They were in the water, with just their heads and shoulders sticking out, and the boat was trapped in the middle of some branches. They were pretty far out toward the middle of the river.
I called out to them as loud as I could. "What's the matter?"
"Orrie, we need help!" they called back. "We're caught on this sunken tree that's floating down the river. We're all tangled up in the branches and can't get the boat out! Run for help! You better run down stream, because we're drifting down fast, and we'll be near the dam before long!"
"I'll run down for help!" I yelled to them. "But don't try to save the boat if you get near the dam. Save yourselves! You can swim ashore. Don't be crazy!"
And then I took off down the road as fast as I could. As I ran, I tried to think what I could do to help, except for getting them away from the boat and to swim ashore if they came close to the dam. I was afraid that they would be just silly enough to stay with the boat because they had promised Mr. Wells not to let it get damaged.
I ran past the pine trees, and got down to the fork in the road that goes over to Dogtail Corner, and right there I saw a pickup truck coming along and I stopped in the middle of the road and waved my arms.
A man stuck his head out the window. "What's the matter?" he said.
I was pretty much out of breath. "My brother and Beaver Murphy are out on the river and their boat is caught in a big tree that's drifting down the river, and if we don't help them I'm afraid they'll go over the dam and drown. Can you please help?"
"Beaver Murphy?" the man said. "I'm Beaver's uncle. Of course I'll help. How far up the river are they?"
"They were up by the waterfall when I left them," I said. "And I ran down here as fast as I could to get help, but the current is awful fast and they'll be down here pretty soon. What can we do?"
He looked up at the river, and squinted his eyes. "I think I see them now. We better move fast. The current sets in here toward this shore, so the tree will come around the bend and come along this bank, then head toward the dam there. They can swim ashore right here pretty easily and we can throw them a rope and haul them out."
"But they don't want to lose the boat - it isn't theirs. They'll probably hold on to the boat, go over the dam, and drown. What can we do?"
Beaver's uncle pulled a rope out of the truck and tied one end of it to a tree on the bank. He coiled the rest of the rope around his arm and looked out over the river as it came around the bend. Now we could see the two boys pulling at the branches of the tree, trying to get the oars untangled, but they weren't having much luck. Beaver's uncle was watching the tree, trying to guess how close to the bank it would come. Now the tree was getting nearer, and the boys looked kind of desperate.
"Beaver!" the man called out. "Catch this rope and tie it to a strong branch. Tie it tight! Here goes!"
He threw the rope out toward the boys. The coils circled out and dropped over the half-sunk tree trunk. Beaver grabbed the rope and tied it to a branch. The tree slid along farther, and then the rope tightened up and the tree stopped moving.
I let out a big sigh of relief. But I was still worried. "Hold on tight!" I called down to them. "The bank's too steep to climb up, the dam is right down there, and the current's awful fast. Be careful!"
The water was a big white surge going over the dam, and it made a lot of noise, so we had to yell down to the boys to be heard. Beaver's uncle cupped his hands and began telling the boys what to do.
"First of all," he said, "you've got to unlock those oars, one at a time, and pass them up here to me. Don't drop them in the river."
The oars were all tangled up in the branches, and it took a lot of work to unlock the oarlocks and slide them out. They passed up the oars, and Beaver's uncle put them in the bed of the truck.
"OK!" he shouted down to them. "Now for the boat! We've got to be very careful. Get those outriggers untangled first, but don't let go of the boat."
He pulled another rope out of the truck and threw one end down to the boys.
"Beaver!" he called, "tie the rope around the two bow outriggers, and we'll slide it up the bank. Be very careful with it now."
Beaver and Henry sat on the sunken log and held onto branches as they eased the boat up the bank, while Beaver's uncle pulled it up slowly with the rope.
"Watch out for the fin, Uncle!" Beaver shouted up to him. "It could bump into the bank if we don't keep an eye on it."
We got the boat up the bank finally and put it on the grass beside the road. Then we lowered the rope's end down to the boys. "All right, Henry!" Beaver's uncle shouted, "tie the rope around your waist, and we'll help you up the bank. Make it a square knot so it won't slip." Henry tied the rope and climbed ashore, pulling on some roots for extra support.
Then Beaver's uncle told Beaver to tie the rope around himself, and untie the rope that was still on the tree. The tree began to move down the river, and we watched until it disappeared in the flood of water washing over the dam.
Finally, we hoisted Beaver up the bank and loaded the boat into the truck. The uncle put it in upside down and rested the front end of it up on top of the cab, where it stuck up into the air, and he tied it down tight to the sides of the truck.
"OK," he said. "Now let's haul the boat up to the Kent School boathouse, and put it away where it will be safe. That poor boat has had a wild trip today."
Henry and Beaver sat in the truck bed and held onto the boat, and the uncle invited me to sit up front with him. "Do you think those boys would have stayed with that boat right over the dam?"
"I don't know," I said. "But I was scared. They had promised to take care of that boat."
"I wonder," he said. "Some promises are hard to keep."
We took the boat off the truck at the Kent School boathouse, and put it safely away on its rack. Then we all got back into the truck and Beaver's uncle took us home. When we walked in the door, Mom and Pop were getting supper.
"What have you two been doing?" Mom asked. "Henry, your clothes are all wet."
"Oh, wow, Mom. You won't believe what happened to us," Henry said.
Beaver Murphy and his uncle were still standing by the door, listening to all the excitement. My father was the first to notice them.
"Come in, come in," he said. "Hello, Beaver. What's all this about, anyway?"
"Beaver Murphy," Mom said, "your clothes are all wet, too. What have you boys been doing?"
The two men shook hands. "I'm Beaver's uncle," the man said. "Roger Murphy."
"And I'm Tom Gilbert," my father said, "and this is my wife Rachel, and our daughter Orrie."
"Yes, I know," Roger Murphy said. "I met her earlier this afternoon. But let's have these two boys tell us what they've been doing today. It's been quite an adventure."
My mother and father turned to look at Henry and Beaver. Beaver looked at Henry.
"Well," Henry said, "we rode our bikes up to the Kent School boathouse, and we took out Mr. Wells' boat and rowed down the river. The water was very high, and there were logs and things floating in it, so we had to keep looking over our shoulders to be sure we wouldn't run into anything. We were practicing our racing starts, and the current was pretty fast, and we got farther down the river than we meant to, down near the reservation.
"The next thing we knew, we'd gotten our oars tangled in the branches of a big tree floating in the river. The branches kept the boat from hitting the tree trunk, so the boat wasn't hurt, thank heavens, but we couldn't get the oars untangled. We were afraid that if we took the oars out of the oarlocks the boat would tip over and fill up with water, and then we would lose the whole thing. We got out of the boat into the water so we could work on the branches, and about then we heard Orrie calling from the west side of the river. We'd drifted down as far as the waterfall, and we were moving so fast down river that we could see we didn't have much time before we would be down by the dam, and then we'd be in real trouble. So we called to Orrie to run down the river and try to get help. Orrie shouted to us to save ourselves and not do anything crazy, but we just couldn't let the boat go over the dam without trying to save it right up to the last minute. But the tree was so big and heavy we couldn't move it toward the shore, and it just kept on going downstream no matter what we did, and we were getting closer to the dam all the time."
"And what did Orrie do?" my father asked.
"I ran," I said. "As fast as I could - or even faster. I wasn't trying to beat anybody, I was trying to save somebody. And when I saw this truck coming along the road, I thought maybe this person can help save them, and it turned out to be Beaver's uncle. He knew just what to do. The boys were saved, and the boat was saved!"
"Thank heavens Mr. Murphy happened to come along just at the right moment," my father said.
My mother closed her eyes for a second, and when she opened them, she took Mr. Murphy's hands in hers. "We can't thank you enough for what you did. It wasn't just that you happened to come along at the right moment, but you were the right person to be there. You had the ropes, and you knew what to do."
Mr. Murphy looked kind of embarrassed at all this. "Well, I grew up beside this river, and I guess I knew what to do all right, but I wouldn't have been much help if it hadn't been for this girl here. If she hadn't stopped me when she did, I would have gone on up the river road and never seen the boys at all. If it hadn't been for her, it would have been a different story, you can be sure of that."
"And," Henry said, "if Orrie had run all the way to our house here, and told dad what was happening, it probably would have been too late to help by the time he got to the dam. We were lucky."
"It wasn't just luck," Beaver's uncle said. "Orrie could run when she needed to, and these two boys needed her. Orrie Gilbert has won a lot of races, but I think this one will mean the most to her."
I nodded, but I was thinking too much to say anything just then. I could see that there was more than one way of winning. You can win for yourself, or you can win for somebody else. Maybe that's what Namowa was getting at.
We all stood at the window and watched as Beaver and his uncle got into the pickup truck, drove down to the covered bridge, and went out of sight.
"What a day!" Mom said. "Look at the time. It's almost seven o'clock, and supper isn't even started yet. I think I'll make some macaroni and cheese. How would that be?"
"Fine," we all said.
"I'll make a salad with sliced tomatoes," I volunteered.
"I'll make corn muffins," Henry said. "If I can remember how."
"And I will make a rhubarb pie," said Pop. "I picked some rhubarb yesterday. Can I share the oven with your muffins, Henry?"
"Sure, Pop," Henry said.
My father has become a specialist in rhubarb pie, partly because rhubarb is one thing the woodchuck doesn't like.
"What about my macaroni?" Mom wanted to know. "Will there be room for that in the oven?"
"Certainly," Pop said. "You can have a whole shelf for it."
The four of us all went to work, bumping into each other at the refrigerator door, knocking elbows as we all worked at the counter. We didn't have much chance to talk until we sat down to eat.
"Well," Mom said. "It's been quite a day."
My father nodded. "It sure has. We were very lucky today. Things might have turned out really badly. At the very least, Mr. Wells' boat could have been smashed up over the dam. And if Mr. Wells had told you boys never to abandon the boat, would you have stayed with it right to the last moment? Would you?"
Henry looked down at his macaroni. "I don't know. I think I was thinking that I would stay with the boat until it got to the dam, and then I would grab a root or a tree on the bank and hold on. I don't know what Beaver would have done. We both wanted to keep our word as much as possible."
My father looked serious. "But how much is possible? How can you know just exactly when it becomes impossible? Just when is the last moment? And suppose you wait two seconds too long, and you can't get out of the current in time, and you go over the dam and you both drown?"
Henry looked hard at all three of us, but he didn't say anything.
My mom reached out and put her hand on his arm. "Henry," she said, "you have to realize that this isn't just a question of a boat. It's also about families and people who love each other. Just think how Mr. Wells would feel if you two boys had drowned because he had told you not to abandon his boat. He would feel so guilty about our family and Beaver's family, and he would know that he could never make up for what had happened. And he would know that, as much as he loves his boat, it isn't as precious as a person. You can replace a boat, but not a person."
Henry looked awfully unhappy. "Yes, Mom, it's true. But sometimes you can't think of all these things at once."
I guess Mom felt that she ought to ease up on Henry. She smiled, and patted his arm. "I know, I know. Sometimes I get the feeling that young boys are so in love with cars, boats and motors that they think they are more important than people. Is that true?"
Henry smiled a little at that. "Well, partly, maybe. But not when they stop and think about it."
"I hope they do think about it," Pop said, "the next time they are drifting down the Housatonic toward Bulls Bridge."
I could see that all this talk was pretty hard on Henry, and he was looking kind of squashed by everything that had gone on today. I thought I'd try to change subject.
"By the way," I said, as if I just happened to think of it, "speaking of Beaver, how did he get the name, anyway?"
"I asked him that when I first got to know him. He said his real name is Bevan, but his older brother began calling him Beaver because he was always playing around in puddles and getting wet all the time. Then everybody began calling him Beaver, and when Namowa heard about it, she said she was glad, because that was the old Indian way of naming children after things that they did. She said that the Schaghticokes don't have many Indian-like names anymore, and it was good to keep what they could. She thinks people should remember where they came from."
"I think Namowa's right," Mom said, "and it's especially important for us Americans. Except for the Indians, Americans are all newcomers to this land. We've only been here four hundred years at the most, and our roots don't go very deep."
"And that," Pop said, "may be why we are suspicious about people from other cultures, because we're afraid they might take away what little we have from the past. Like our English language, for instance. Americans have not done very well with learning other languages. In our schools, everybody was supposed to learn Latin, which nobody uses outside of school, and we weren't so interested in teaching French and German and Spanish and Italian, and these were all countries that Americans had come from. But schools don't like to change too quickly, because they don't want to lose something important."
Mom laughed at that. "Some schools act as if they didn't want to change at all. Take the sports program at Center School in town here. The tradition there has been to have most of the sports for boys, like football, hockey, basketball, and baseball, and for girls they would just have field hockey and nothing else. The boys' teams would have lots of games with other schools and the girls' teams didn't have any outside games. It's been that way for years and years."
"Why was that?" I said.
"Because," Mom said, "when your grandmother was in school, teachers and parents thought sports were for men, and women weren't supposed to be able to run or throw balls or do anything athletic that would give them muscles. When I was in school, the girls could be cheerleaders to encourage the boys' teams to play hard, but they couldn't play themselves."
"You mean," I said, "You didn't have any regular teams for girls? That doesn't seem fair."
"It's not too different from that now," Henry said.
I could see my mother was getting steamed up about one of her favorite topics. "It's not easy for small-town schools," she said. "It costs money to get the teams back and forth, and the athletic budgets are pretty small, so we can't expect too much. But, the girls' teams are supposed to have just as much athletic money as the boys' teams. That was decided under Title IX of the federal Education Amendments in 1972. But schools can be so slow in changing their habits that we haven't really lived up to the rules."
"But Rachel," Pop said, "you're smiling about something. You look as if you had some good news to give us. What's going on?"
"Aha!" Mom said. "I thought you'd never ask. Something very interesting happened yesterday, and I told Principal Finley about it, but nobody else. It's going to be announced next week, but it's supposed to be a secret until then. Mr. Finley told the selectmen, and they said I could tell you three, because the family was going to be involved with it." She sat back and smiled at us.
"Well," Henry said, "What is it, Mom?"
"I'll tell you," Mom said, with a big smile. "Yesterday I had a call from the American Council on Education, and they told me they had been getting a lot of complaints from schools about unequal support for sports programs. Boys are still getting a good deal more federal money than girls are for uniforms, coaching and travel. Title IX was supposed to put a stop to that in any schools that get federal support. Now the American Council on Education wants to put on some kind of ceremony that will get all these slow-moving schools to follow the Title IX rules. But they want to do it in a friendly, positive sort of way, and they want to have the ceremony in a school that has a famous girl athlete, someone that everybody has heard about. They'll give her an award, they'll give the school an award for encouraging sports for girls, and they'll urge PTAs and alumni groups to help raise money for uniforms for both boys and girls."
"But what's this got to do with us?" I wanted to know.
My father looked at Henry and winked. "What do you suppose it has to do with us, Henry?"
"Don't you see, Orrie?" my brother said. "It's because you're the famous girl athlete. You never seem to remember that."
"Oh, wow," I said. "Even after I turned down the trip out to Cincinnati?"
"Yup," Henry said. "And they don't even know about what you did to help Beaver and me."
"But that wasn't a race, Henry," I said. "That wasn't sports."
"I think it was a race, Orrie, and you won it."
"But I didn't do it all by myself," I told him. "It was Beaver's uncle who really rescued you."
"But he wouldn't have rescued us if you hadn't told him we were in the river."
"And besides," I said, "it wasn't really a race, because in a race you try to beat someone, and I wasn't trying to beat anyone."
My father held up his hands. "O.K., O.K.," he said. "We don't really have to argue about whether it was a race or not. The point is, that what Orrie did was terribly important to us, and that she was here, and not out in Cincinnati, and that without her help, things might have been - well, they might have been awful."
Nobody said anything for a while after that, I guess because we all were thinking about the Housatonic River, and all that water going over the dam, and maybe Henry's and Beaver's bodies floating down through the falls, and somebody finding them in the river down at Gaylordsville or Boardman Bridge. I didn't want to think about that.
"Well," Mom said, "the awful things didn't happen, and we were lucky. And a lot of lucky things have happened for us. Tom's going to have a water turbine loaned to him so we can try out some home water power to see if people can use water power instead of nuclear power. Our schools are going to be encouraged to live up to Title IX to make it more fair for girls and boys. Henry and Beaver didn't smash up Mr. Wells' boat, and they didn't get smashed up either. And all of this is because Orrie started running in races and winning them.
"If she hadn't won those races the way she did, things would have been very different. When she won those school races, people began to hear about her, and she got to be a public figure. And then the power company thought they could make good use of her, and then the U.S. government thought they could make good use of her. So you see, winning races is important."
"Of course it's important," Pop said. "But it may be too important."
Henry was looking back and forth at Mom and Pop. I think he likes to see them argue about things - if they don't get too serious about them.
I'm not so sure I like to see them arguing, maybe because I think that they might get too serious, and I wouldn't like that. I guess what I like when people disagree about things is to be able to understand how the other person sees it. If you can work it right, then instead of fighting over things, people could end up as friends. But I guess that isn't very easy to do, because if it was, we wouldn't have so many wars all the time.
As Mom and Pop went on talking, I began to see what Namowa meant when she told me that ideas have races, too. Mom's idea was that if you win things, and people get to hear about, then you get some power out of that, and then you can use the power to make things better. I guess that makes sense.
But then I think I see what Pop is thinking, too. If winning gets to be too important, then you feel that you've got to win no matter what, and then if you lose, it's terrible.
We had finished our macaroni and salad, but we were still talking about winning things, and we were too busy with that to move on to the rhubarb pie.
"Look," I said. "What are games really for, anyway?"
"To see who can win," Henry said.
"More than that," Mom said. "It's so you can have your fair share of things."
Pop looked around at the three of us. "I think it's more than that. It's so we can find out what works best."
I couldn't help laughing at that. "It looks as if we all have different answers." I told them.
Mom pointed at me. "What's your answer, Orrie?"
"I think games are to have fun with each other. So we can be friends."
Mom looked at me for a minute.
"You know, Orrie may have the best answer yet. I have to admit that sometimes I take sports too seriously. I want them to mean too much."
"Maybe we all do that," Pop said. "Just look at our professional sports now. Think of what they pay the big-time baseball stars. It's getting to be money, money, and money. No wonder we take it too seriously."
"But it is fun to win," Henry said. "That's why Beaver and I went out on the river on Wednesday, but it turned out to be a mistake. We got into trouble and we should have known better."
My mother reached over and patted my hand. "You know, Orrie, I think you show a lot of understanding for a young person. How did you get to be so wise?"
"Maybe it was from talking to Namowa up at the reservation. I think she is a wise woman."
"Everybody thinks so," Pop said. "She's the Wise Woman of the Schaghticokes."
"Hey," Henry interrupted. "We haven't had our dessert yet."
Pop got up from the table. "You're right. I'll bring in the pie."
He served out the pie in large slices, and for a while we didn't say anything except "mmm" sounds.
"Good pie!" Henry said when he was finished. "The best part of the meal."
"I thought the macaroni was best," Pop said.
Mom said the salad was tops.
I said Henry's corn muffins were special.
"There now," Pop said. "We've had our big argument, and we all came out winners."
"And it is fun to win," Mom said, "especially when we can all win together."
And we all smiled at each other.


text:
Dainty Damask Invitation
Card No. S38G400
The intricate damask pattern on this striking Invitation fuses modern style with vintage flair. Add your own personal style to this luxurious design by choosing your favorite ink colors, fonts and paper stock. An entire collection of coordinating wedding components is also available, including an optional Pocket Folder.
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- Optional Pocket Folders Available

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Police activity reports
Compiled from selected police activity reports.
Buckeye Lake
• April 1: A Heath man was stopped for speeding and running a stop sign on Mill Dam Road. The officer found the man was intoxicated and driving with a suspended license. The driver was charged with speeding, running a stop sign, OVI, and DUS.
• April 2: A six-year-old child was reported missing from Ryan Park. The child was later found safe at home.
• April 2: Police checked out a possible illegal burn.
• April 2: A Walnut Road woman said her juvenile son was involved in a fight with another juvenile, who injured her son. However, neither juvenile's parents wanted to press charges.
• April 3: A Zanesville man reported someone entered his Buckeye Lake property without permission.
• April 3: Police responded to a report of a suspicious person on West 1st Street. No one was located.
• April 3: A possible shoplifter at the Family Dollar store paid for all items when police arrived.
• April 4: An alarm was accidentally tripped at a Walnut Road residence.
• April 4: A North Bank Road property owner wanted a person removed who was living at the North Bank property. Property owner was advised it was a civil matter for the courts.
• April 4: Police responded to an alarm drop at the Buckeye Lake Museum.
• April 4: A Highland Avenue woman reported her jewelry as missing.
• April 5: A Walnut Road resident told police he could plainly see marijuana growing in his neighbor's home. The officer reported he could also clearly see the marijuana growing from the complainant's window. The cultivator was arrested and the crop was seized as evidence.
• April 6: Police were dispatched on a report of someone causing a disturbance at a Highland Avenue residence. The resident told police that everything was OK.
• April 8: Police stopped a Cliff Street resident whose car windshield had a large crack that interfered with the driver's view.
• March 8: Police advised a Buckeye Street resident at midnight to turn down loud music.
• March 8: Police on patrol at 1 a.m. saw a vehicle leaving Evans Park that matched the description of the vehicle reported to be involved in recent vehicle break-ins. Police stopped the vehicle and identified the occupants. The information was turned over to the primary investigator on the break-ins.
• March 8: Police on patrol at 12:37 a.m. saw a car in Evans Park. The couple said they were just talking. They were told that the park closes at dusk.
• March 8: A North 9th Street mother called from work to report that her 16-year-old daughter at home had told her that her 12-yearold daughter had heard someone tapping on her window. Police patrolled the area, but didn't see anyone.
• March 8: Police were called about a suspicious occupied vehicle sitting in the Kroger parking lot. The driver was an employee that was talking to a female friend before heading home.
• March 9: Police on patrol at 1:50 a.m. saw an open door at Sunfield Equipment. Police and a deputy checked the building. A keyholder arrived and confirmed that everything looked OK. The door was secured.
• March 9: Another driver was cited for a stop sign violation on West 2nd Street at Cumberland Street.
March 17 - 29
• A motorist was warned for a traffic violation on Lancaster Street.
• Police responded to a report of a suspicious person at the Valero station.
• Police were called to the storage units on North Lancaster Street where several locks had been cut off.
• Police took a report on the theft of tools and a four wheeler from a storage unit on North Lancaster Street.
• Police humanely destroyed an injured deer that had been struck by a vehicle.
• Police took a report on an assault involving two juveniles. The incident has been referred to the juvenile prosecutor's officer for review.
• Police responded to the report of a missing juvenile, then went to another location where the juvenile was found.
• March 30: Police were called to the storage units on North Lancaster Street where locks had been cut off some of the unit.
• March 30: A driver was warned for traffic violations on Lancaster Street at Lynn Avenue.
• March 30: A motorist was warned for excessive speed in the school zone on Lancaster Street.
• March 3: Police responded to a complain of harassment on 5th Avenue.
• April 2: A driver was stopped for travelling 54 mph in a 20 mph school zone. The driver was cited for excessive speed, reckless operation, driving without a license and driving under suspension.
• April 2: Police handled traffic control on a fire department run to a North Lancaster Street business.
• March 24: A Thornville woman was cited for travelling 40 mph in a 25 mph zone.
• March 24: A driver was cited for a traffic light violation.
• March 26: Police responded to multiple reports of thefts from vehicles.
• March 27: Police were called to the sheriff's office to conduct a BAC test for a New Lexington Police officer.
• March 27: Police assisted the Perry County Sheriff's Office in a search for a 9-1-1 caller claiming to have a heart attack. After a 30- minute search for the cell phone caller using GPS, police found the man overdosed on prescription drugs and meth in the village park. He was transported by the squad to the hospital.
• March 27: Police on patrol spotted an open garage door on Foster Drive in the midst of multiple calls about thefts from vehicles in the area. Police investigated and found two adults inside who had turned off the lights to hide from police. The Ohio State Highway Patrol assisted police. The two extremely intoxicated individuals were eventually identified. One feared that his father-in-law will be angry if he discovered that he was partying in his home.
• March 27: Police assisted the Ohio State Highway Patrol at the police station with a possible intoxicated driver.
• March 27: Police responded to a report of a theft from an auto on Foster Drive with the victim in pursuit. The victim lost the suspects on Grandview Drive and provided descriptions to police. Extra officer were called from home to assist in the search.
• March 27: Police on patrol found two male subjects walking on Veterans Memorial Drive that matched the description of the suspects breaking into vehicles. After detaining the individuals and questioning them, police said they admitted to breaking into vehicles during the past two nights. Police also said they had stolen goods on their persons.


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A push to market Nevada as a recreation paradise is leading to three new major sports festivals in the Reno area, tourism officials announced.
SledFest 2004, a national snowmobile festival, is scheduled to debut in April in Reno and the nearby Sierra, said officials at the Reno-Sparks Convention&Visitors Authority.
The Mastercraft Pro Wakeboard Tour is expected to kick off here in June - probably at the Sparks Marina with national television exposure.
And a series of youth and adult basketball tournaments are planned to start in February and run through September 2005 at the Reno-Sparks Convention Center.
"Most of the events that we announced fit hand in glove with our strategy of positioning this destination as `Reno-Tahoe, America's Adventure Place,'"Jeff Beckelman, RSCVA president and chief executive, told the Reno Gazette-Journal.
SledFest, which will feature a trade show in Reno and trail riding at Lake Tahoe, is expected to draw 5,000 participants its first year.
"SledFest is designed to be an annual event to reach a demographic we normally would not,"Beckelman said."A majority of snowmobilers recreate in the Midwest."
Plans call for the Mastercraft Pro Wakeboard Tour to take place June 5-6 at the Sparks Marina, and be broadcast nationally on ESPN and Fox Sports Network.
A wakeboard is similar to a snowboard, only it's pulled by a motorboat like water skis.
The RSCVA is joining forces with the local Jam On It Basketball Academy to hold 23 basketball tournaments at the convention center, which will house 30 full-size courts.
The tournaments are expected to draw more than 2,000 teams, 24,000 players and 27,000 spectators from across the country, and pump about $18 million into the local economy.


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As President George Bush's second inauguration approaches on January 20, opposition Democrats are doing a lot of soul-searching about the future of their party in the wake of their defeat in November. National correspondent Jim Malone has more on the Democrat's dilemma from Washington.
Democrats have a lot of questions and concerns as they prepare to watch as the president is sworn in for a second four-year term.
In the last two presidential elections, Democratic candidates Al Gore and John Kerry failed to carry a single southern state, an area of the country that used to be a party stronghold.
Senator Kerry's strategy was to maximize Democratic turnout in regions of the country where the party is strongest, the northeast, upper Midwest and West Coast.
Donna Brazile ran Al Gore's presidential campaign in 2000. She says the party needs to broaden its appeal to have any chance of recapturing the White House in 2008.
"We cannot be a regional party," she said. "We have to return to being a national party. We have to be a party that appeals to all segments of the electorate and not just certain slices, as I say, a cookie cutter approach [limited] to politics and campaigning."
Ms. Brazile was among several Democrats who discussed the future of their party at a forum in Washington sponsored by the Hotline political newsletter and the University of Virginia.
In order to be more competitive, Democratic activists say the party must also do a better job of reaching out to religious voters who have tended to vote Republican in recent years.
Former Indiana Congressman Tim Roemer is one of several candidates for Democratic Party Chairman. He spoke on ABC's This Week program.
"When you talk to most of America, a lot of people do not feel that we are [able] to express our faith, to communicate values of faith, not just on issues such as abortion but on issues such as our concern for the poor," he said.
Another candidate for party chairman is former Vermont Governor Howard Dean, who lost out to Senator Kerry in last year's Democratic presidential primaries.
He warns Democrats not to stray too far from their liberal roots in an attempt to reach out to moderate and conservative voters.
"It is important for us to talk about our [religious] faith," he said. "It is also important for us not to change our faith."
Many political analysts believe President Bush's most important advantage in last year's election was the public's perception that he was strong on national security in the wake of the 2001 terrorist attacks.
Jim Jordan managed John Kerry's campaign for a time in 2003. He says Democrats must do a better job of convincing Americans that they can protect the country from terrorism.
"At the end of the day, the biggest structural problem for us is that we are a party on the federal [national] level, in Congress and with the presidential campaign, that the public simply does not trust us to keep them safe," he said. "When that is first and foremost in their mind, in a cold war environment or a neo-cold war environment like now, we have serious problems."
Republicans hope to exploit this period of Democratic introspection and plan to push a conservative agenda both in Congress and around the country.
David Frum is a former speechwriter for President Bush. He told the cable public affairs network C-SPAN that Republicans expect the president to fulfill his campaign pledges to reform the tax and pension systems without making major concessions to the Democrats.
"I do not think the president ought to say I am going to be compromising on the things I was elected to do," he said. "Elections are the way the American people or any democratic people decide things. He has as strong a mandate as any president ever, certainly as strong as any president I can remember, and he has a duty also to his supporters to make good on the things he committed himself to do."
As for the Democrats, the next major phase in their internal debate comes next month in Washington when the 447-member Democratic National Committee votes on a successor to current National Party Chairman Terry McAuliffe.


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Stephen Greenblatt, John Cogan University Professor of the Humanities at Harvard University and winner of the 2011 National Book Award for non-fiction, is one of the world's foremost literary scholars and critics. He is credited with inventing the literary methodology known as The New Historicism. He is also the author of two bestselling works of literary history, the 2004 Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare and the 2011 The Swerve: How the World Became Modern, the work for which he received the National Book Award. In this, the second of a two-part interview, Greenblatt focuses on these two books. He notes how early discussions with the filmmaker Marc Norman resulted in Shakespeare in Love, written by Norman and Tom Stoppard, and inspired him to write his own speculative biography of Shakespeare. In Will in the World, he postulates, for example, that Shakespeare might have been a secret Catholic; he also notes historical events that might have led to the composition of The Merchant of Venice. His more recent book, The Swerve, covers the rediscovery in the 15th century of a work by the Roman philosopher and poet Lucretius. Lucretius's poem De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things) put forth the idea that the world was made of atoms with no antecedent cause or eventual end to their continual movement and combination. In the book, Greenblatt traces the complicated route that leads from Lucretius to the world of Darwin, Einstein, and us.
Visit the Website: http://www.drexel.edu/thedrexelinterview
Episode #202 / Length: 26 minutes


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Following what has become a near-annual tradition, the pride of Caguas fought at Madison Square Garden the night before the parade and won, beating Joshua Clottey in a narrow split decision to the delight of thousands of flag-waving Puerto Rican fans.
The win was hard earned, however, and left many, including a disappointed Clottey, who seemed to dominate the fight, wondering if Cotto didn't win on home-field advantage alone.
With the victory Cotto (34-1), retained his WBO welterweight title and, perhaps most importantly, a shot at facing pound-for-pound king Manny Pacquiao, who watched the fight alongside promoter Bob Arum, who promotes both boxers. Arum said afterwards he hopes to have them fight soon.
Amped by the crowd, Cotto came out strong, knocking Clottey (35-3) to the floor with a hard right hook in the closing seconds of the first round. But Clottey, who hails from Ghana, controlled the fight the rest of the way.
Exhibiting a stubborn aggressiveness, and surprisingly strong defensive skills, Clottey set the tempo after the first round, cutting the ring off and driving the champion to the ropes, where he stayed for much of the fight.
At the end of the third the two head butted inadvertently and a gash was opened over Cotton's left eye, a cut that continued to bleed as the fight wore on. Showing signs of wear, and in desperate need of winning a round, the gutsy Cotto responded in the fifth and again in the eighth by trapping Clottey in a neutral corner, but was unable both times to finish the challenger.
By the later rounds Clottey emerged as the dominant fighter, to the surprise of the 17,000-plus fans who packed the world's most famous arena. The Ghana native landed more than twice as many impact punches, but still couldn't take Cotto down, though he gave him a beating.
After the fight Cotto appeared swollen-faced and exhausted, while an unmarked, furious Clottey fumed that he had been robbed.
"The winner of the fight is the one who's supposed to be fighting hardest. He was running and I was chasing. I threw the hardest punches," Clottey said. "They robbed me."


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Surely a study like this is not funded by the organic food industry?
Organic food is much better than inorganic food.
Organic food is much better than inorganic food.
I guess so - but Candy?? In the BJPsy?? Over here we eat sweets! As far as I am concerned the whole premise is scuppered so the conclusions can go hang!
Surely a study like this is not funded by the organic food industry?
Organic food is much better than inorganic food.
Except for salt
Surely a study like this is not funded by the organic food industry?
Not that I've read TFA, but do you have any evidence to back that statement ?
Surely a study like this is not funded by the organic food industry?
Not sure why the organic food industry would have an interest in funding a study like this. Maybe you're assuming that organic!=junk food. This isn't the case, as there are plenty of companies producing organic junk food, such as chocolate, high fat ice cream and deep fried snacks like potato and corn chips. Consuming organic food doesn't guarantee a healthy diet, that's still up to the individual.
Yeah, we all know we can't trust any of these "scientific" studies because the organic food corporations are so much more gigantic, rich and powerful than the fast-food corporations.
It's like global warming. It's all a lie. The tree-hugging hippies have soooo much money and power that they bought all the scientists, the media and all the politicians, too. The poor oil corporations don't have a chance.
A British study would be looking at the effect of *sweets* rather than *candy*.
For an excellent overview of this story I recommend this critique of the paper [www.nhs.uk] from the English NHS's excellent Behind the Headlines [www.nhs.uk] service. Unlike a newspaper it will tell you who did the study, how it was funded, where the data came from and whether the results are worth anything. In this case the data was severaly limited and had put people into either "eating sweets every day" or "not eating sweets" which is very coarse categorising.It also doesn't report the absolute number of children who went on to become adult offenders. In conclusion
"Overall, this study on its own does not provide strong enough evidence to guide childhood dietary advice, although common sense says that eating too many sweets is probably not good for children. Before the newspapersâ(TM) explanation for a link can be believed there must be studies specifically designed to investigate the issue from the outset."
..."eating sweets every day" or "not eating sweets" which is very coarse categorising.
This is often done to get a significant test result. A Chi2 correlation test will give different results depending on the "bin" sizes.
So you start with fine grained bins and then start pooling until you get a significant test. If you still don't get a significant result, try other tests that can be used. This of course creates massive problems for the validly of any "significant" result.
Hang on a second, are you seriously expecting Slashdots mainly american audience to read something by the socalist NHS? Quite clearly the reason for the NHS denying this study is that they WANT people to get ill to continue their socialist principles.
Next time you hear people decry the "socialist" NHS think on this report and ask how in the US medical system is focusing on prevention.
"Overall, 69% of respondents who were violent by the age of 34 years reported that they ate sweets nearly every day during childhood. Sweets were eaten this regularly by 42% of those who were non-violent."
This is an inconclusive result if I've ever seen one.
I very much doubt any British study would have looked at candy consumption as that's not a word in common usage over here.
That's too bad. Sounds like a new market for Hersheys...
Criminals which have been eating candies when they were 10 are dump at the age of 34. The criminals which did not eat candies at the age of 10 are less likely to be caught.
And if I see again this: "Thirty-five of those children went on to report at age 34 that they'd been convicted of a violent crime, the researchers found."
Parents who regularly give their kids candy usually are the sort of parents who aren't disciplining their kids. Candy is often used by such people as a replacement for parental authority in controlling their kids' behavior.
In my observation, the kids whose parents make NO attempt to control their kids' behaviour wind up in better shape than those kids whose parents attempt to BRIBE their kids' behaviour.
The do-nothing parent at least doesn't actively warp the kid. The kid may not learn anything from his parents, but he will learn when other people whack him upside the head for being a mannerless little prick. He may even develop urges to more-mature behaviour on his own (to gain respect from peers, teachers, or whoever), thus
It seems to me there are too many uncontrolled (and probably even more unknown) variables for any meaningful conclusions to come from this. The biggest thing that's missing from all these social science studies is any sort of objective or quanitfiable units of measurement. Until they can all agree on HOW violent, in standardised units, there's nothing worth dis
When will people finally learn? Studies like that are just stupid. Absolutely nothing was shown here.
Simple explanation (just an example of cause):
Less educated families tend to give their children more sweets. Lack of education is responsible for criminal activities (causality assumed for this example). In such a scenario there would of cause be a correlation between sweets and crime but obviously no causality.
Absolutely nothing was shown here.
Perhaps this study showed that there is a need for further study? Knowing that there is a correlation is the first step to determining causation.
Or maybe violence causes candy.
If you eat candy as a replacement for love, you are more likely to be violent because of a lack of love.
Just a theory. And one way of many. But I've seen it too often, that a addiction, being itself a replacement for something else you need, does mean that when you don't get it, you become desperate and do things that you normally would not do. Not specifically violence. More like when you destroy everything around you because you can't stand the situation. (Similar to rage.)
We should be clear about those two things:
1. Candy is a likely candidate for addictions.
2. Addictions always are a replacement for a lack of something else.
So find that something else, and help the person get that stuff so much, that they forget the addiction because they don't need it anymore.
For children, this usually is the lack of good parents.
(I said for a long time, that social and parenting skills must be an essential skill you learn in a class in school! [Which for the second generation will mean that they also learn it from their now capable parents at home.])
If you eat candy as a replacement for love
Who would eat candy as a replacement for love? That's what the television is for!
1. Candy is a likely candidate for addictions.
Candy is addictive. It's not candy though, it's sugar and it only matters a little bit where it comes from. Sucrose vs. Fructose is basically irrelevant because wonder bread vs. sucrose is not really a competition. To your body, they're the same thing. That's one reason this study is stupid. You could never allow your child to eat a candy bar, but serve them cap'n crunch for breakfast every day and you're just begging for juvenile diabetes.
Your body produces insulin for the process of breaking down carbohyd
Children of parents who encourage poor & impulsive choices grow up to make poor & impulsive choices.
Statistically demonstrable != sensible
If Candy's violent, ban the bitch. Hell put her in jail if you have to. Just leave my sweets alone you motherfuckers.
"Bad and Clueless Parenting Linked to Violence"?
The big problem with Anglo-Celtic society, is that we always love to yammer on about our rights and inalienable right to individual freedom, but never our responsibilities to each other.
Libertoons who try to defend the indefensible in the name of "freedom" and "individual liberty" annoy the hell out of me. They're every bit as bad as Marxists, religious crazies and animal rights extremists.
Libertoons who try to defend the indefensible in the name of "freedom" and "individual liberty" annoy the hell out of me. They're every bit as bad as Marxists, religious crazies and animal rights extremists.
I am a bit confused by this comment -- what are you calling indefensible -- giving children candy? I agree, bad parenting is bad news, but how are we going to go about solving that? A child will be much better off in the end with jack-off, irresponsible parents than if you rip them out of the home and into foster care. We need to educate people to make the right choices. And yes, I will defend the rights of parents to give their children candy, just because the last thing we need is more government interv
A child will be much better off in the end with jack-off, irresponsible parents than if you rip them out of the home and into foster care.
What, like this one? [bbc.co.uk]
How much worse could it have been? [timesonline.co.uk]
Food additives and hyperactive behaviour in 3-year-old and 8/9-year-old children in the community: a randomised, double-blinded, placebo-controlled trial [thelancet.com]
Even that study could have been done better but it was enough to get the point across. Petrochemical food additives such as artificial coloring (FD&C anything), flavoring and preservatives (BHA, BHT, some others) are inherently toxic and immune response to them varies wildly between individuals. With some people you'll never notice a difference. With others, the tiniest bit of, say, red dye will make them hyper, violent, you name it. Synthetics are a major reason why ADHD has become epidemic.
For me, synthetics were making me more impulsive and a bit mean. Nothing dramatic but switching to a clean diet made a noticeable difference in my psychology and I'm in better shape now too.
Keeping synthetics out of your diet can be difficult. It helps if there's a nearby Whole Foods Market or similar store that bans all synthetics. There is NO REASON for synthetics in food other than that they save food processors from having to buy real ingredients.
Why haven't you heard more about this? Who's going to pay for the research? It won't lead to a prescription drug, surgery, or any other medical intervention. It'd wipe out most of the market for ADHD meds (not all, some people have congenital neurochemical imbalances). It would require people to learn how to cook again.
Much more info at the Feingold Association research [feingold.org] page.
"Don't hog it all, smelly-head!"
"Go to hell, zitface!"
I'm always suspicious of statistical studies that reinforce cultural beliefs.
Was the study designed as part of a series of studies to understand how people ended up in prison or designed to show that one way or another, it's the parents' fault?
I made a similar study, using myself as the test population. I discovered that when I don't get my daily dose of chocolate, I become violent, and that 100% of those studied had this response!
Each new user of a new system uncovers a new class of bugs. -- Kernighan


text:
The Bucknell University Department of Public Safety is committed to creating and maintaining a safe and secure campus. In an effort to accomplish this goal we provide a variety of training opportunities that can be requested and/or downloaded. Below you will find a presentation request form that can be filled out and submitted to have a presentation facilitated by an officer or member of public safety. In addition, we have provided information of additional topics that can be reviewed and self-taught in addition to or in lieu of a live presentation.
If there is a topic you would like to have presented that you do not see listed, please feel free to contact us to see if we can facilitate your request or perhaps provide you with suggestions or alternatives as to where to find the information you are looking for.
If your group is interested in a presentation by Public Safety on Event/Party Management, Travel Safety, Personal Safety or one of many other available topics, please fill out a Presentation Request form.
If you would like to suggest a topic for a future event, contact Captain Douglas Lauver.
The following links are virtual breadcrumbs marking the 27 most recent pages you have visited in Bucknell.edu. If you want to remember a specific page forever click the pin in the top right corner and we will be sure not to replace it. Close this message.


text:
No. 5: It Doesn't Matter If You're Scared Of Heights; Get In The Cloud
Gartner reports that CIOs are increasingly seeing the benefits of the cloud -- a leading way to improve IT with its proven advantages of saving money, doing more with less and increased agility. "To a certain extent, the cloud decision is being made for us. The fairly rapid expansion and adoption of SaaS, PaaS and IaaS services means that we must quickly, but correctly, figure out our own cloud strategies," said Niel Nickolaisen, CIO of Western Governors University. "Given the increasing number and quality of cloud offerings, we CIOs had better be the ones driving this cultural shift—otherwise, we are on the path to obsolescence," he continued.


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The Yakima Health District has received confirmation from the Washington State Department of Health and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that the Sept. 19, 2009 death of 71-year-old Ruth Rogers of Sunnyside was caused by West Nile virus.
This is the first death from West Nile virus in Washington state.
Yakima County has had 20 confirmed cases of West Nile virus this year and the Yakima Health District is awaiting confirmation from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on three more potential cases. Besides the one death, all the other people in Yakima County with the virus are recovering.
"The Yakima Health District has anticipated potential complications from West Nile virus because of the increased number of cases this year. That does not lessen the weight and devastating loss endured by the family and community," said Dr. Devika Singh, Deputy Health Officer for the Yakima Health District.
"We at the Yakima Health District offer our deepest condolences and support to the family and affected communities in Sunnyside," Singh added.
West Nile virus is transmitted to humans through mosquito bites. During peak mosquito season several precautionary measures are encouraged, including eliminating standing water, using appropriate mosquito repellant, avoiding being outdoors around dusk and dawn (peak mosquito hours) and wearing
long sleeves and pants when in areas with mosquito activity.
Because the temperature is colder now and freezing temperatures are beginning to be seen throughout Yakima County, mosquito activity and the risk for West Nile virus infection should be decreasing for this year.
Only one in five infected people develop symptoms of the virus. Onset of illness occurs three to 14 days after being infected by the bite of a mosquito carrying the virus. Illness typically resolves without medical help. Symptoms include fever, headache, body aches, rash and swollen lymph nodes.
A more serious form of West Nile virus disease affects less than 1 percent of symptomatic cases, producing symptoms such as neck stiffness, disorientation, coma, tremors, convulsions, muscle weakness, paralysis, or even death.
Individuals over 50 years of age appear to be more susceptible to developing this more serious form of the virus. People experiencing any of the above symptoms should consult their medical provider.
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