The Best American Sports Writing 2011 (46 page)

It is something the others also say, that they feel a connection to Paco and his family. With the aid of Lara Moretti, the family services supervisor for GOL, Sonia reached out to the recipients in a letter to let them know who her husband was, how deeply she loved him, and how she hoped that they were doing well. Says Moretti, who vets each correspondence: "Typically, families look upon the donation as a small bit of good that can come out of something terrible." One by one, the recipients replied—again, through Moretti. They told of their ordeals and of how grateful they were, how the organ they received allowed them to become fully alive and be with their loved ones. In a way that she had not anticipated, Sonia found the letters she received to be helpful to her as she had moved through the stages of grief. Sonia says she hopes that she can remain in contact with them.

"The 25 years that Francisco lived were awesome," says Sonia, as a photograph of her husband looks down at her from the dining room of his boyhood home in Chicago. "He was healthy and enjoyed life to the fullest—and now [the recipients], who have suffered for so long, have that opportunity. I want to be sure they are okay and taking care of themselves, not just because they are carrying a piece of Francisco with them but because life is supposed to be lived. I pray for them every day."

Along with what Sonia has told them, the recipients have found out more information about Paco online, where there are portions of a few of his bouts. Alexis says that she became "obsessed" with learning more about him. Given that she is a big boxing fan, she says she is surprised she had not been at the Blue Horizon for his bout with Kennedy. It was an event she would have attended, and can only think that she stayed at home that evening because of her health. But she has looked into who Paco was and says "he was no slouch," not just a fine amateur and pro boxer but a good family man, "known for joking around and laughing." Says Alexis: "I was happy to learn that he had that kind of spirit."

The bond to Paco that they feel is a deep one. In the hard days that followed her surgery, during which she experienced periods of dementia, and in her subsequent hospital stays over the course of the last year, Meghan would find herself saying, "Come on, Paco! We can do it. Work with me on this." Once, she looked down at her hands, which for a period were covered with gloves. She said to herself: "Look! I am a fighter, just like Paco!" When she had a setback in March, she rubbed the scar at the site of her incision and promised Paco: "You know, if you get me out of this, we'll go see your wife and your little girl." Meghan says she hopes to do that at some point, if only just to thank Sonia and the Rodriguez family in person.

"I feel I am not just doing it for myself now, but I am doing it for him and his family," says Meghan, who is a graduate of Elon University in North Carolina. "I want to know how Sonia is doing. I want to know how Ginette is doing. I want to go there and visit, and see the gym where Paco boxed. Me, being an athlete, I understand the dreams he had. I had wanted to be a champion. So I want to be a part of that. I would like to think of them as my extended family."

Vicky has a photo of Paco taped to her refrigerator. "When Sonia wrote me, I read her letter three times," she says. "He was so young. And she is young. But you could see there was this strong bond between them. I hope that we can become close. I would like that. Like the daughter I never had."

Vicky pauses and adds, "Somehow just saying thank you is not enough."

 

There will be a wedding. Bob Owens did not think he would ever have the chance to do it, but he will walk Ashley down the aisle and give her to Jesse. While there are still plans to be arranged, Ashley says she would like to have her wedding outdoors at the Valley Forge National Park and then honeymoon in Greece. Jesse says he would prefer to go to the United Kingdom, but says that Greece is fine, that he keeps telling her: "You set it up. Go where you want to go and I will follow. I want you to enjoy yourself."

Given that it is very likely she would have died were it not for the transplant, Ashley looks upon each day as precious, even if there are some worries as she moves forward. While her doctors have told her there is no physical reason she cannot have children, she is aware that the life expectancy statistics for lung-transplant patients are somewhat less encouraging than they are for the other organ recipients. "They say only 50 percent survive five years and 20 percent survive 10 years," says Ashley, who adds that she has also been told the absences of setbacks in the initial year are a positive indicator. But what also has her concerned is how she is going to continue to pay for the care she has to have, which includes 25 prescription drugs each day. While she and the other recipients have been covered by health plans, it has offset only a portion of the costs that they have incurred.

But Ashley does not dwell on any of this. Instead, she thinks of Paco and Sonia and Ginette; she thinks of her parents, Bob and Charlotte, and her brother, Robert; and she thinks of Jesse, who held her hand before she was wheeled into surgery and held it again when she came out. She thinks of what she can now do that she could never do before: get on a bike and go wherever she pleases; dive in a pool and hold her breath underwater; and slip on a pair of running shoes and just take off. It was something she did last March when she and her family were at Longwood Gardens. Seeing a big field stretched out before her, she challenged her brother to a race and shouted, "Daddy, take a picture!" And off she ran, the sun on her back, the wind rushing over her face.

FROM SPORTS ILLUSTRATED

N
EXT SPRING
the NCAA women's crew season will begin again. On lakes and rivers across the country, fleets of skinny boats will skitter over the water like giant insects, their wooden legs moving in unison. Happen upon a race, and your eyes will be drawn to the powerful women in the bow of each boat, the ones with backs like oak doors who tear great gashes in the water, pushing and pulling and exhaling clouds of carbon dioxide until their chests are aflame and their temples thump. For a moment, though, it's worth shifting your gaze to the stern, to the wispy figure of the coxswain. She'll be the only woman facing forward, the only one without an oar. Indeed, she'll barely even move, instead just sitting there ... talking. If you are unfamiliar with the sport, you might wonder about this small woman's purpose, wonder if she can even be considered an athlete. After all, how can you be an athlete when all you do is talk? What difference can a woman like that make, anyway?

You'd be amazed.

 

It started as a dull ache in Jill Costello's abdomen, the kind you get after a night of suspect Chinese food. Only it didn't go away. It was June 2009, and the Cal crew had just returned from the NCAA championships in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. The Bears had finished second, behind Stanford, continuing a remarkable run of six top-four finishes in seven years.

Jill came back to Berkeley elated. She had coxed the third boat at nationals, which meant she had a good shot at being in the top varsity boat as a senior. As for the nagging pain in her bloated stomach, she assumed it was stress-related—the product of late nights cramming for finals and early mornings practicing on the water. So when her good friend and teammate Adrienne Keller headed to the trainer to receive treatment for a balky back a few days after nationals, Jill decided to tag along; maybe she could pick up some pills before heading out for the summer.

When the two women walked into the training room, the tall, broad-shouldered Keller dwarfed Jill, who was small and thin, with porcelain cheeks, a cascade of brown hair, and an ever-present grin. Looking at the pair, you'd never have guessed they were teammates.

Understand, Jill never set out to be a coxswain. Nobody does. Growing up in San Francisco, she'd competed in the same sports as her friends: soccer, field hockey, cross-country. She had enough talent as a dancer to perform with the San Francisco Ballet as a nine-year-old, but she quit when told she'd need to devote herself to it full-time. She loved being part of a team too much for that.

There was only one problem. While her two older brothers kept growing, each eventually surpassing six feet, Jill stayed small. And no matter how hard she tried, it was tough to be a soccer goalie when she was the shortest kid on the field. By the time she was a senior at St. Ignatius College Prep, Jill had topped out at five-four and 110 pounds and was focusing her college aspirations on crew, the only sport in which her size was an asset.

The fit was more than physical. The coxswain's role is twofold. She's expected to steer the boat, factoring in the wind, tides, and at times the uneven stroking of her crew. (All coxes fear the moment when a rower "catches a crab"—that is, snags an oar in the water on the return stroke, jolts the boat, and even, in extreme cases, ejects herself.) The coxswain also acts as a surrogate coach, relaying information, determining strategy, and providing motivation.

This Jill could do. She'd always liked being in charge. One of her first phrases as a toddler was,
Me do.
Not long after, she began bossing around her older brothers. The way Jill saw it, life was too short to wait for things to come to you. While most of her teammates at Cal had a tough enough time juggling crew and school, Jill worked with Habitat for Humanity, was in a sorority, and was vice president of the Panhellenic Council, which governs campuswide Greek life. At times her mother, Mary, found Jill's intensity exhausting. Even when shopping for clothes, Jill wouldn't buy a pair of pants unless they were perfect.

Such traits might have been grating in someone else, but pretty much everyone liked Jill. How could you not? If you looked sad, she'd puff out her cheeks, pull out her tiny ears, and make monkey faces until you laughed. If you were the new kid, she was the first to come up and start a conversation. When her roommate and best friend at Cal, K. C. Oakley, left school for a semester to go to Colorado, Jill texted her every day to say good morning and good night. It was Jill who nicknamed Cal crew head coach Dave O'Neill "the Coif" for his gravity-defying puff of blond hair and did a perfect imitation of the "jiggle-jaw" face he made when exasperated. (From anyone else O'Neill might have chafed at the jokes, but his bond with Jill was so strong that he asked her to be the godmother of his son, Dash.)

A goofball? Sure, but a dedicated one. As a sophomore Jill went to the DMV and took the test for a Class B license so she could drive the team van, and then she rose at 5:30
A.M.
six days a week to pick up rowers for practice. And while most coxes avoid workouts—after all, their only physical requirement is to make weight (110 pounds for women)—Jill joined the team for cardio sessions and training runs. "She's as good an athlete as I've ever had as a coxswain," says O'Neill.

That's why no one thought twice about her stomach pain, including Jill. It came as a shock, then, when Linda "Smitty" Smith, the team trainer, told her that Friday after nationals, "Got some bad news, Jill. Turns out your lab tests are out of whack. Your white blood cell count is pretty high. You need to get to an ER, and you need to do it tonight. It's probably nothing serious, but better safe than sorry."

Jill called her mother and her aunt Kathy Morello, both nurses, and they drove her to the emergency room at California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco. There Jill received a blur of diagnoses, each more frightening than the next: first she was told she had a serious infection, then grapefruit-sized cysts on her ovaries, and, a few hours later and most ominously, masses in her lung, liver, clavicle, and one breast. Radiologists came from across the hospital to peer at the results, disbelieving: a perfectly healthy 21-year-old nonsmoker with no family his lory of the disease had lung cancer, which three days later would be diagnosed as stage IV, the most advanced form. In just a few days Jill had gone from being a carefree college student to being told she probably had nine months to live.

There is no such thing as a good cancer, but lung cancer is just about the worst. The survival rate is 15.5 percent, and making matters worse, the disease comes with a stigma. Patients with lung cancer are assumed to have earned it, having inhaled toxins for years. Yet 20 percent of women diagnosed with lung cancer each year—about 21,000 in 2010, roughly the same number as new cases of ovarian cancer—never smoked. Because of lung cancer's reputation as a self-i nduced illness and its low survival rate, it rarely attracts big research money. In the last 40 years the survival rate hasn't budged.

Theoretically, at least, Jill stood as good a chance as anyone else of surviving. She was young and fit, so she could endure treatments that most other patients—whose average age is 71—couldn't. The chemo began within the week. Jill was told, as she wrote in her on-line journal,
to use only baby shampoo and soft toothbrushes, to get those protein shakes down and that weight up, to try on this wig and that hat, and to stock up on a list of drugs so long you'd think I was a dealer.
Her summer plans went from hiking in Tahoe to being spoon-fed blueberries in bed by Aunt Kathy.

When she asked her doctors about rejoining the team, they looked at her as if she were crazy. Crew? She'd need all her strength just to make it through each day. Jill didn't care. She told her mom she saw cancer as "just another thing on my plate." Besides, she'd had three goals for the better part of her adult life: to graduate from Cal, to cox the first boat, and to win nationals. She saw no reason to change them.

 

Rowing appeals to certain personality types. Converted swimmers do well at it, for example, because they are accustomed to monotonous practices. As O'Neill says, "It's a fitness sport, not a skill sport," which is another way of saying it's about desire. Consider: Cal has one of the best programs in the country, but its team includes both Olympians and women who are just discovering crew—as if the 12th man on the Duke basketball team were learning the game a month before the season.