December 2, 2020
When I was learning to write, one of the first pieces of advice I was ever given was to remember that every character is the hero of their own story. When I was learning to race, the first piece of advice I can remember was the fastest runners are tall and wore bright shoes.
For years both pieces of advice ruled how I viewed my two worlds, but there was an underlining, unifying piece of advice that bridge these two worlds that no one wanted to say out loud. It didn't matter if I wore bright shoes, there was a specific type of runner that was fast, just like there was a specific type of character that could be considered a multifaceted hero, and neither one looked or acted like me.
When I first started writing my hero characters, I made everyone the same way. Blonde hair, blue eyes, muscular, at least 5'7 if they were a girl and always 6 feet tall if they were a guy. They had to be charismatic, confident, a little cocky, and self-entitled. Still, at the end of the day, everyone else in the story knows they're different; they're the chosen one.
I hated writing those types of characters, but I had to. See, I wanted to be a fantasy writer, and if I made my character appear any other way, that's when the comments would start.
"Oh, is the story you're working on about slavery?"
"Are you planning to write historical fiction?"
There was nothing wrong about that, necessarily. I'm black. People expect me to be angry about the past, about now. They expect me to want to write about what they consider the typical black people things.
When I say no, they would always give me a polite smile. Their smile would stay polite as we talk about various writing techniques and character motifs. That is until I had to leave class early for a meet. Or I accidentally said something about track or running. That's when they would ask more questions, and I would be forced to say the three dreaded words, "I'm an athlete."
I can't say I blamed them when their polite smile became an unintentional sneer. Their gaze becoming a glare. It makes sense why they had this reaction if you considered what they've always seen. Just like how there's a particular type of multifaceted character in media and stories, especially fantasy, there was a particular type of athlete. Athletes in children's TV shows and old, 90s, and early 2000s movies were supposed to bully people like them.
They heard athlete and their minds instantly went to the most cocky, rude, and self-entitled person they knew, whether they were an athlete or not. Not me, who purposely wore baggy clothes to hide her muscle for fear that if all my writer friends knew about track, they would never get to know me.
It was the same with track.
My fantasy books would be hidden in my overstuffed bag come practice. I would change from clothes that I thought made me look more like the type of person who would write to the type of clothes that I thought would make me look like a runner. The only thing missing was the bright shoes. But I doubt the shoes would have made the difference. My personality just didn't vibe with what people thought top athletes should act like. Despite my clothes, I definitely didn't fit what they thought an athlete should look like.
People think athletes, and they see a tall, lean and muscular person. If you're thinking about a high school track athlete, you picture kids wearing their letterman jackets with the confidence of a hero who wears spandex, who carries around their hard-earned backpacks or gear from invitational meets with a certain swagger that made you go, yep they were the best of the best, the chosen ones.
So when I was at meets running my best in the 400 and the 4x4 and I would walk off the track, change into my comfy clothes, and walk up to the rest of the team, parents assumed I was the team manager or did a different sport that didn't include running. It became painfully obvious to me that I wasn't one of the chosen ones.
Especially when I told those in my athlete world that I wanted to write. Their first words were always "Athletes don't write." Or "Wow, you don't see a lot of writing athletes." Or "Oh so that's your passion, let me guess your dad is forcing you to do this sport?"
I would just smile and laugh because it was easier than saying that they both were. I love both writing and running, and I want both to be my future careers.
My junior year, I realized high school was ending. Those around me and the stories I read told me I had to pick between track and creative writing. Everyone kept telling me athletes don't write. Writers didn't run. Fantasy writers didn't make main characters like me, like my writing friends, like my athletic friends who didn't fit the generic archetype. None of us could be written as multifaceted characters with more than one goal, so we had to pick.
It was just how people saw the world.
At least that's what I thought.
Until my junior year, the first time I did the 4x4 with my sister.
It was our first relay together, and I didn't want to let her down. I remember I placed my hand on her shoulder just before we took our spots on the track and squeezed it. "You got this." I did my best to keep my voice steady. I didn't want her to know how nervous I was with her around. With her there, I desperately wanted to be that overconfident stereotype that I felt I was forced to write.
If she sensed my nervousness, she didn't say anything; instead, she smiled at me. The same toothy grin I've seen all my life and said, "Don't worry, I shall become the flash." It wasn't the typical response I was expecting. In stories, when a big event is about to happen, usually the heroes were the most serious, the most hero-like. She'll hate me for saying this, but all I saw was my happy sister, not a hero, but she was the hero of the night.
Without her, our relay team wouldn't have gotten the place that we did. Which was weird considering everything I've been told to think up to this point. There were so many other girls that fit that athlete, hero stereotype racing against her that night. They all wore bright shoes, all of them 5'7 with a vibe that said they were the best, but not a single one passed her. With her goofy smile and black shoes, my sister held off every person I and everyone else subconsciously saw as the perfect athletes.
I wouldn't realize this after her leg of the race, nor the next day when I grabbed my notebook full of notes about my blonde hair, blue eye hero character and my darker skinned beloved mentor character, who as all fantasy stories told me I had to kill and put them in storage. But eventually I would look back on that night and question the unspoken advice that combined my two worlds. It made me wonder how many others like me felt that they too were guided by these unspoken rules?
Once I started questioning what was once the foundation for my two favorite things in the world, I started to truly enjoy them again. I started needing, wanting, to succeed at both of them. It's how I ended up here at UCI, a college with both a great track program and graduate creative writing program.
Sure, sometimes I still get discouraged when I mention my love of fantasy and someone suggests I write historical fiction. People still look at me and imply that I can't be that good of an athlete, but that's on them.
I don't have to make my character a way I don't want to, to write a story about fantasy about things that I as an individual want to write about. I don't need to start acting like I'm one of those "evil" 80's jocks to be an athlete. No one does.
And in these times, where things are constantly changing, maybe the advice we give young writers and athletes should change too.
Zani Meaders - Women's Track & Field
