Anyone who knows me knows that I am a VERY sentimental person and wear my heart on my sleeves. Friday night I witnessed something truly special and even trying to properly do it justice on the radio nearly brought me to complete tears.
Friday night at Harmon Field was a football game won by a very good Wapakoneta team over a St. Marys team that is struggling this season but getting better and closer to putting it all together every week.
This isn’t a recap of the game like I usually do every week, that will appear in the Lima News. This is a recap of the amazingness of humanity I witnessed.
Above are just a couple of the pictures from the pregame with folks wearing the pink out shirts made by some amazing local shops in a hurry to bring both communities together tonight in honor of 11-year old Jersey Poff who passed away last week.
Seeing two local communities who don’t see eye to eye for a lot of things come together to #LiveLikeJersey and sing Dolly Parton songs and just enjoy life and celebrate an amazing young lady from St. Marys was a terrific way to spend a Friday evening, game aside.
At the start of the game many pink balloons were released by those in the crowd.
I will not pretend that I had the pleasure to know young Miss Jersey or her mother Alison but once upon a time a much younger Jody Poff was my baseball coach. While I may not have become a major league prospect (I don’t blame Jody…..much) I’m sure I became a better young man being around him.
Perhaps it’s because I’m a softy for people I’ve known in my life going through bad times or because I feel the connection to having a young full of spunk and energy daughter of my own, my hear went out to Alison and Jody in a way I can’t begin to explain.
As I said earlier, this blog post is to give kudos to the communities of St. Marys and Wapak and to all those who showed up for the Poff family in their time of need and to the families of all of the other young people we have lost in the last two weeks locally to say THANK YOU. Thank you for putting life and community above rivalries and coming together to be there for your neighbor…..we all could use a little bit more of that these days.
Wapak and St. Marys staff and players came together after the game and as I signed off the radio I cried and I smiled…..as I’m told Jersey would’ve wanted me to at this moment.