Thanks

There's a particular person that was in my life for a very brief period who I never got to thank. Not that if I extended my words of gratitude, he would accept them. This person was one of our trainers on the soccer team at UNCW, and honestly, he's what I miss the most about being on that team.

All of our coaches were really, really smart guys. Our head coach was valedictorian of his class, our assistant coach studied neuroscience in college, and our trainer, well, our trainer was very, very humble. You see, he was always talking about how much smarter our other two coaches were, and whenever we commented on how intelligent or knowledgable he was, he would always deny it. But really, he was one of the smartest guys I knew, and not just in one subject. He knew about muscle groups and bones that I had never heard of. He could easily teach an anatomy class at UNCW. He was practically an expert on health and food groups and exercise. He almost always had an answer to our never-ending questions about a weird ache, how to stretch a sore spot, or why a lift was hurting somewhere it never had before, and how to fix it. And when he didn't have an answer, he wouldn't bullshit you. He wasn't afraid to say "I don't know, Allie G."

I always really admired him. He was always building everyone up around him, but never insincerely. If you were slacking off or hungover or what have you, he was quick to take notice and quick to reprimand, which is exactly what you look for in a trainer. He was an amazingly colossal part of the functioning of our team, but kindly refused praise or thanks or gratitude, always politely deflecting the spotlight back on us- the players- and the coaches. He was always so positive, even at six o'clock in the morning, and never failed to deliver quick words that uplifted the entire team in a matter of seconds, no matter how worn out or beaten-down we were.

Another thing I loved about him: he loves and he is passionate about what he does. You can see it even in our warms ups, the way he always snaps his fingers and singles out people to tell them they're doing a great job, even if it's just as simple stretch. I truly hope that one day I can be as passionate about something as he is about our and the men's soccer team. He cares about each and every player on both the men's and women's teams. Of course he doesn't get paid the highest salary, and he knows it. He could train for any school in the nation, but he stays with UNCW, because he's that dedicated. 

Yes, he was the one timing our sprints. Yes, he was the one directing our 6am lifts. Yes, he developed our fitness tests. And through all that, our entire team still respected and appreciated him, which really says a lot about a person. I truly believe that our team would not have been as successful as it was if it weren't for him. You can ask anyone on that team, and they will tell you the same. I guess what I'm trying to say is, Mark was a really positive influence in my life over the past year, and I only hope that I can pay that forward to someone else.