Q2: Post 2 Golden Girl

Although the autobiography i am reading is about Natalie Coughlin, it also tells a lot about the people around her. You learn about her college coach, Teri Mckeever, her parents and siblings, and also teammates. The author includes these people in the "story" because they are a part of Natalie's life. Her decisions affect them; their decisions affect her. One constant theme throughout the book is that even though one may make a decision with yourself in mind, it affects others as well.
One of the biggest decisions in someone's life is where they want to go to college. For Natalie, one of the main factors that affected her decision was swimming. She decided she wanted to go to Cal, because of the coach and team there, even though her parents wanted her to go to Stanford. Natalie's parents said that "Oh god she (Natalie) hated us. That whole situation was really ugly, and it took about two years to live it down" (61). For weeks the Coughlins fought over where Natalie wanted to go to school. The disagreement caused tension within the family for weeks. The decision Natalie made to go to Cal caused a lot of anger within the Coughlin family.
Another big decision in Natalie's life was not made by herself. It was made by Haley Cope, her good friend and teammate. Haley decided to switch schools because she didn't like Teri Mckeever as a coach. Natalie was devastated, and was quoted saying "I need her" (99). The loss of Cope affected Natalie at practices, because she was a great person to race against. It also hurt the friendship between the two girls, because it felt to Natalie as if Cope was betraying her. It shows how much decisions can affect people.

Quarter 2: Post 1

I am reading Golden Girl, by Michael Silver, which is the biography of Natalie Coughlin. Natalie Coughlin is an Olympic gold medalist swimmer, and her biography tells the story of how she got so far in the sport. One theme that has already been shown in the book is how a negative attitude can lead to unfortunate consequences. In her teenage years, she swam with a swim team she ended up not liking very much. The coach of the team was verbally abusive to the girls on the team, sometimes telling them “You girls are fat… you need to watch what you are eating” (Silver 31). This negatively affected the swimmers. Many girls got eating disorders, or simply quit the sport they loved because of it. Natalie hated the criticism, and it made her move teams.
Another example of how negative criticism affected her was when an older swimmer, Staciana Stitts on her college team tried to get inside Natalie’s head. The swimmer, who older than Natalie, and jealous of her swimming abilities said to her “You’re not a team player” (Silver 20). The criticism affected Natalie greatly. Natalie began hating to go to swim practice because of Stitts. It also affected Natalie’s swimming, and made her go slower times.

Silver, Michael. Golden Girl. Rodale Inc. Michael Silver. 2006.