On Meeting Pauline Davis-Thompson
for the First Time
Copyright 2018, Mark
Cullen/Trackerati.com, All Rights Reserved
In recent years, students from
Lithuania made annual treks to the school in Seattle where I worked for 41
years.
Every visit I would approach
them and ask, “Is Virgilijus Alekna still the bodyguard of your prime minister?”
How’s that for an ice breaker?
They would look at me - astonished
- and ask, “How do you know that? We were told athletics (track and field) is
not such a popular sport in America.”
The doors to cross cultural
communication had opened, and without my speaking a word of Lithuanian, the
conversation was on. We had something in common – a discus thrower – and from
there we spoke of ourselves, each other, and our lives.
One summer I was on campus
while a candidate was being interviewed for an English position. As few adults
were present that day, I was asked to come speak with the candidate, even
though our subject areas were different.
“She’s from the Bahamas,” I
was told.
“I’ve got this one nailed,” I
thought to myself.
We hit it off well, and even
better when I let this little bit of information slip.
“I was in the stadium in
Seville in 1999 when –“
“WHEN THE BAHAMAS WOMEN’S
RELAY TEAM WON GOLD AND BEAT THE US!!!”
Why, yes.
We had more than enough to
sustain our conversation, and finally I was told that it was time for the real
interview to begin.
The real interview had just
taken place.
What’s most memorable to me
is the candidate’s description of how life stopped the moment Debbie Ferguson
crossed the finish line in triumph. People poured out of buildings into the
streets, traffic stopped, and a national celebration was on.
“I’ve also heard that
employees just left their positions and ran out of banks!” a still astonished
Pauline Davis-Thompson said outside the IAAF Heritage exhibit in Ostrava, Czech
Republic on Friday.
Our meeting was 19 years in
the making.
Davis-Thompson, who ran third
leg on both the 1999 World and 2000 Olympic gold medal teams and is the Sydney
Olympic 200m champion, is serving her 3rd 4-year term on the IAAF
Council. I was meeting with Chris Turner, Director of IAAF’s Heritage program.
You can guess what story I
told Davis-Thompson.
She loved
hearing how her performance and that of her teammates had influenced the course
of a job interview several years later.
Instant connection.
The Bahamas women’s 4x100m
relay team pulled off a colossal upset in the 1999 Seville World Championships,
defeating France, Jamaica, and the United States.
It wasn’t quite such an upset
the next year when they won the Olympic gold medal in Sydney.
“No, it wasn’t – was it?!”
laughed Davis-Thompson.
“Not anymore,” I replied.
I have always said that track and field is my international
language. Almost every time I meet someone from a country other than mine,
there is an athlete I mention or a memorable performance I note. What
we have is a common heritage, an international heritage, even if it may not always seem so at first glance.
The doors of friendship and
understanding fly open when we discover what we have in common, and what we
invariably have in common is a track and field story, an event, a shared memory:
where were you when?
She asked for my business
card.
“Track and field
storytelling,” she read. “Yes, indeed.”
As for the candidate?
She got the job.
 |
Speaking Track and Field
Honored to be with Pauline Davis-Thompson, Bahamas
2 x Olympic Gold
1 x World Gold
Dude, get a comb.
You never know when you're going to meet an Olympic Champion. |
