Brian Hagberg
Maybe it was simply a coincidence, or maybe something stuck. I can’t say for sure, but it was fitting that less than 24 hours after Marc Mero left Warren County, one of the main points of his message was on full display at War Memorial Field.
Titusville’s Kaleb Sopher limped across the finish line, victorious in the 200 meters by just 0.2s over Warren’s Ethan Best. After the finish, Sopher grabbed his hamstring and fell to the ground. Rather than ignore his opponent, or sulk about coming in second, Best immediately offered assistance to help Sopher stretch the ailing muscle.
Once finished, Best extended his hand to help Sopher to his feet.
The imagery so directly tied to what Mero said during his presentation just the day before, that it seems to be more than just coincidence.
Near the end of his presentation, Mero played the famous video of Derek Redmond’s father rushing onto the track and helping his son finish the 400m semi-final race at the Barcelona Olympics after Redmond tore his hamstring 150m into the race.
After the video, Mero said, “Life isn’t about winning the race. It’s about how you finish the race and helping others to finish the race.”
Best didn’t specifically help Sopher finish this particular race, but Best did what he could to help Sopher finish the next race. And that’s really what it’s all about.
Yes, we can compete with each other on the track, on the field, on the court, in business, and in a myriad of other venues. But at the end of the day, we all need to help each other if we’re going to grow as a community.
Again, our students are showing us how we can grow. While it is the Warren Area High School Class of 2025 Officers who are hosting the Suicide Awareness Walk on Sunday (Editor’s note—Your Daily Local is a sponsor for the Walk), they made sure to include students from other schools in the process as well.
“We can say Warren is where it was really affected (by the students lost to suicide this year), but also other schools are affected as well,” Sophie Walker said. “The students aren’t just part of Warren they’re their friends from other schools. Even though this tragedy did happen in Warren it also can bring other schools in our district together.”
Bringing them together, not just in mourning and healing, but also, perhaps, in ending long-standing and outdated animosity between the schools.
“I don’t think it’s really like cool or edgy to view different schools as like less,” Anna Courson said. “I know, I have a lot of friends from Eisenhower because of the All-County Musical. They’re not enemies. They’re normal people. So why should we treat them as enemies?”
They’re choosing not to let their feelings towards others be defined by which school they call home. They’re choosing to support one another.
As Mero said, “We are defined by our choices.”
Can the rest of us make choices the way these students are? Can we choose to stop letting our community be defined by old grudges and arbitrary lines on a map?
If these students can make those choices, then we certainly should be capable. We can start to set aside our differences and work to make sure all of us finish the race.
