Second Chances of Life, Choosing a New Path and Euthanasia
The final four stories in The Best American Sports Writing 2020 by Jackie MacMullan all deal with either death, a near-death experience or a completely life-altering decision no one saw coming.
Amy Ragsdale and Peter Stark’s What It’s Like to Die from Heatstroke uses a second-person storytelling narrative to make the reader imagine what it’s like to almost die from heat stroke.
After a night of drinking, one man takes a trip over a volcano to go surfing by a beach. He is the only person going towards the water due to really high temperatures. While going down the volcano ridge, the man passes out after hallucinating, vomiting blood and having his temperature at around 110 degrees.
The man is discovered by two Spanish hikers and is rescued after being on the brink of death. At the end of the story, Ragsdale and Stark give tips on how to overcome and survive heat stroke.
The man in this story got lucky, but in Andrew Keh’s The Champion Who Picked a Date to Die, a former Paralympian decided to end her life via euthanasia.
Marieke Vervoort was a wheelchair sprinter in the Paralympics. She is also a former gold, silver and bronze medalist. Despite the international fame she achieved, she wanted to end her life.
She suffered from a painful muscular condition. She had come close to scheduling her euthanasia multiple times, but she finally went through with it. Her pain was so immense to the point where she actually looked forward to her death. She was also openly addicted to morphine.
She had a last-minute goodbye party on a Saturday in October. Three days later, she was put to death.
These stories not only deal with the lives of humans but dogs as well. A Second Chance by Emily Giambalvo talks about how dogs in Michael Vick’s dog fighting ring got a second chance at life.
Originally, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, better known as PETA, and the Humane Society wanted the 47 dogs tracked down by the Washington Post to be put down because they thought the emotional distress and the infliction of pain would be too much for the dogs to overcome.
However, BADRAP, an Oakland-based organization, emerged as an early advocating voice for the dogs to live. They worked with individual dogs affected by the dog fighting ring to heal them and make sure they can become good pets.
Dog fighting continues to be an issue in the United States, but steps have been taken to heal the problem. It has been a felony in all 50 U.S. states since 2008, and former NFL quarterback Michael Vick, who is infamous for his dog fighting rings that landed him in prison, has donated a lot of money to a lot of projects that advocate respect for dogs and to end dog fighting.
Shelly Pennefather was one of the best college basketball players in her time at Villanova, but she did not make a career in playing professionally. Elizabeth Merrill goes more in depth on Pennefather’s life in Whatever Happened to Villanova Basketball Star Shelly Pennefather? “So I Made This Deal with God.”
She played professionally for a brief time in Japan because there was no WNBA at the time. She didn’t want to play in an additional round-robin for two months after her team got off to an 0–5 start.
She became Sister Rose Marie of the Queen of Angels. She’s been a sister for about 30 years. She talked about having many children with John Heisler, a friend she has known for most of her life.
Sisters do not leave their monastery unless there’s a medical emergency. By becoming a sister, she has essentially cut all ties with her family, but she said she lives with no regrets.
The man who almost died from heatstroke should be on an episode of I Shouldn’t Be Alive, a television show where people almost died while doing thinks like hiking or mountain climbing. Vervoort’s story should be used in a documentary talking about euthanasia and people’s views on it. Her story can also be its own documentary about her life accomplishments.
The dogs who were given a chance from Vick’s fighting ring should be a part of a feature story and possibly a documentary. Pennefather’s story could be a feature story and could be used in a story about women in sports since the WNBA didn’t exist when she was playing in Japan. Maybe she would’ve been one of the best players in the league’s history if it was around before becoming a sister.