Target Shooting and Choices

In 2014 Matt Emmons was breezing along in the air rifle competition at the Olympics. He was in first place and far ahead of his competitors. Everyone said he was one of the best at hitting the center of a target that they had ever seen. He got to the last marker and knew he had plenty of time. But for some reason he got nervous, maybe the crowd noise or his own thoughts or whatever, so he rushed his shot. But listen to this: he chose to hurry  his shot and missed badly,  so badly that instead of hitting the target in his lane,  he hit the target one lane over. Holy Competition! That meant he got no score on the last round and fell to last place. There was no gold medal.

When Wilson kid Mark was competing in persuasive speaking, he had no real worry through contests we went to or district. When we got to regional at South Plains College, I had no doubt that he would get one of the top three places and go to state. He got through prelims easily and spoke in the finals. I was all over the campus checking on students who were in other contests like journalism or other speaking events, so I wasn't there when he finished. He and his mom(shout out to mom) had to get him to a track meet and left before the results were posted. I headed back to the speech building and walked through the student center where results were shown on a screen: Mark's name was not in the top three. I couldn't believe it. The competition in finals must have been outrageous. When I got to the parking lot of the speech building, the director of the contest was getting the judges' sheets collected and recognized me. "Congratulations on your student's win." Wait a minute. I told her that his name was not on the board in the student center. We walked over with the judges' results to talk to the regional administrator. When we got all the sheets out and checked them, we found the mistake. The student who had spoken first in the contest but had placed last had mistakenly been given first place, and Mark who had spoken 6th was given that number on the board when actually he was the highest ranking.

So the coach for the student who actually got last place was called in, and she said without hesitation that the results had to be final, and her student even though he was really the lowest ranking speaker should be given the medal and the state berth. I went back to Wilson and told dear Gary who said we would get a lawyer if necessary because Mark deserved first place and the right to go to Austin. Two days later South Plains called and said the rankings had been changed although the coach for the lower ranked speaker demanded that he be  given compensation of some kind.  We then found out that the young man had already placed in the top three in a journalism contest and would be going to Austin on his merits only she wasn't his coach in that area. So we went on to Austin, and Mark won first place in state which showed that he should have been there. But when he finished his last speech, a good one that was going to give him a state medal, I saw the young man who had at first mistakenly been given regional honors. He was by himself, no coach. He came to me and said, "I'm so glad Mark is here, and I know he will win. I never wanted to have the first place regional medal when I didn't deserve it. My coach just kept saying we had to stick with the original placements. But it wasn't my choice. because I didn't deserve it." Love that blonde boy wherever he is today.

Small towns face complex problems even though residents of bigger cities think life is perfect. In 1989 Slaton had a building on the railroad track that was about to fall into ruin. It was one of the last remaining Harvey Houses built in connection with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe railroads. It was a place that had been fine dining, a grand two story building where unmarried women, ages 18-30, signed contracts to be waitresses and display "good character" as they waited on travelers. Harvey Houses and the Harvey girls were known all over the United States, and the one in Slaton had been built probably in 1912. But all these years later, it was anything but fine. It had been closed since 1942, and damage was apparent. The smart thing would have probably been to tear it down to keep from any further deterioration. But Slatonites made their choice: they would raise the money to restore it despite the fact that it would be a huge sum. They began their campaign, got volunteers to think of every way possible to get money, and slowly and carefully brought the Harvey House to much as it had been in its shining glory. There were times when some people thought it was crazy and should just be counted as a dream not considered carefully. But a group kept pushing and showed that the Harvey House could be saved. Now there are only 6 left in Texas, and Slaton's Harvey House is used for gatherings of every kind where people want to remember beauty from the past.

Every day we are faced with jillions of choices, and we make them with the hope that we are doing the right thing. Shooting at a bullseye, admitting a mistake, or caring for something that needs help all involve decisions , and with careful thought, we can go on through life and make it a better place.