Archdeacon: ‘Run with your legs; Win with your heart’

Last year, Lisa Parlette got word that the 74-year-old Scheve – three years retired from the college – had found someone who wanted to donate $1 million to the project that had consumed her for the past 11 years since her 20-year-old daughter, Jenna, died suddenly after collapsing near the finish line of a cross country race she was leading at Franklin College in Indiana.

Jenna had been one of the most beloved and admired athletes ever at Wilmington.

She had – with considerable adjustment and sacrifice – overcome the epilepsy she’d been diagnosed with at age 12.

She had done the same a few years later as a sophomore at Miamisburg High when, after collapsing at a Lions Club race in town, she’d been administered CPR on the course, That led to a heart problem diagnosis that required a pacemaker and a defibrillator, which, in true Jenna fashion, she nicknamed Fibby.

Through it all she’d become a standout cross country and track athlete for the Vikings and, after her 2011 graduation, she went on to Wilmington and truly blossomed.

She set school records in the 5,000 and 10,000 meters; was a five-time All-Ohio Athletic Conference honoree, was a Dean’s List student, and worked a side job as a greeter at Dayton Dragons’ games.

She was remembered not just for what she’d accomplished, but for what she helped others do.

Often when she’d finished her training, she’d circle back to help anyone needing a run-beside-you friend to help them complete their efforts.

She was known for her kindness, her loyalty and her sense of humor. That’s why her death hit so many so hard and no one more so than Lisa.

Jenna was her only child. After she and her husband divorced, she raised Jenna on her own with the help of her parents Charles (known as Pete) and Carole Parlette.

The special bond that Lisa and Jenna shared was seen in their nightly ritual.

“Her bedroom was very close to mine and at night we had this great prayer just before we each fell asleep,” Lisa said.

In the darkness Lisa would say “Jesus loves you.”

And Jenna would always answer, “Jesus loves you.”

Back and forth it went:

“God loves you”… “God loves you.”

“You’re my best girl.”… “You’re my best girl.”

“I’ll see you in the morning light”…. “I’ll see you in the morning light.”

The pair completed their prayer for the last time on Aug. 30, 2013. That was the night before Jenna collapsed face first in the grass, 30 meters from the finish line and went into seizures.

After that Lisa – who works at LexisNexis – searched for a way to cope with that now unanswered prayer.

When people began donating money in her daughter’s name, the Wilmington president at the time asked if she had any special project she wanted the funds to go to.

“I said, ‘Well, my daughter always told me, ‘We need an indoor running track.’”

That became Lisa’s mission, though she had no idea how to go about it or what such a facility would cost. Eventually, she was told they’d need $2 million to build it.

She threw herself into raising money and that gave birth to two separate entities: The Jenna Parlette Memorial Foundation, which would focus on building the indoor track, and The JennaStrong Scholarship Fund.

The nonprofit efforts were administered by the Dayton Foundation, but Lisa was the primary fundraiser. She put on races, made pitches to the Clinton County Commission and at the Ohio Statehouse.

She was in contact with everyone from Senator Sherrod Brown and then Governor John Kasich to Nike co-founder Phil Knight, to whom she sent a letter and bowling pins.

She said Jenna used to run holding bowling pins to work on her form and she needed something to catch Knight’s attention.

After 11 years, she had managed to raise $100,000, though $19,000 of it she’d put in herself from an NCAA insurance check and $25,000 came from an anonymous donor.

The rest came from a grassroots set of respondents, including a Troy church that has donated regularly and a little girl at the Turkey Trot who offered her $5 allowance.

But when the meeting was called a year ago, it became clear the $100,000 was far short of what was needed. Ever hopeful, Lisa said she just hadn’t gotten in front of the right person with means to tell her heartfelt story.

Still, the reality of the situation eclipsed her earnest intent. The college wanted a $2 million endowment to maintain the running facility and architects informed the group that the building’s cost would be $8 million to $9 million.

After the college president suggested downscaling the project, Lisa finally asked Scheve, who hadn’t mentioned the source of the $1 million offer, what he thought.

“He had been very quiet and after he picked up the plans and studied them, he took a long pause and finally looked at me and said, ‘Hunnh ...You way overshot!’

“I’m a big girl and can take criticism, but I’m also pretty sensitive and I was kind of taken aback.”

Angela Mitchell – a respected professor at the school who, like Wilmington’s cross country coach Ron Combs, had become Lisa’s compatriot in the project and was her good friend – stepped in and told Jerry some of the work they had done.

She told about going to all the other colleges in Ohio that have indoor running facilities – including Cedarville and Ohio State around here – and talking to athletic directors and coaches.

When the meeting ended, Lisa said she happened to follow Scheve down the stairs:

“He turned and gave me a big smile, a nod and a wink.”

That should have been a sign.

But in this story, too often when good things have happened, so also have bad.

Jerry was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and his health began to deteriorate.

When another meeting was convened this past St. Patrick’s Day, he was too ill to attend.

Not sure what was about to happen, Lisa suddenly was told by Wilmington College administrators that a donor had stepped forward who wanted to finance the entire project and wanted it to be called The Jenna Parlette Running Center.

“I went into shock and broke into tears,” Lisa said. “So did Angela and Coach Ron (as she calls Combs) was near tears, too.

“I just kept thinking, ‘Who would be so kind? Who would do this?’”

On the way out, she was told the donor was Jerry Scheve.

He was giving $23 million to Wilmington College – the biggest donation the college ever had received – although no one had known he had any accumulated wealth.

Before this, the 1971 University of Dayton grad was best known for his 30 year-coaching career at Wilmington that included 518 victories, the NCAA Division III national title in 2004 and the induction into the Ohio Basketball Hall of Fame that came with it.

“It turns out he joined an investment club in the 1970s and put his money in a couple of little-known start-ups then – Apple and Microsoft,” Lisa said.

Before he died this past May 19, Scheve instructed the university that he wanted his gift focused on athletic excellence, peace and conflict resolution programs and international affairs.

He wanted The Jenna Parlette Running Center built in all its glory.

Along with an eight-lane indoor track it would have room for tennis, basketball and all-purpose courts as well as conference and meeting rooms.

Displayed prominently inside will be the motto that Jenna’s much-loved grandfather, whom she called Papaw, came up with and she then lived by:

“Run with your legs;

“Win with your heart.”

JennaStrong

When Jenna was in the sixth grade she was diagnosed with juvenile myoclonic epilepsy.

Some three years later, after the collapse in the Lions Club race in Miamisburg, she was fitted with the pacemaker and defibrillator.

That’s when her Papaw coined the “win with your heart” phrase.

While the rewired heart gave her a slogan, it also gave her quite a shock – literally.

At the very next race in Fairborn, she dropped to the ground writhing in pain.

Lisa initially thought it was another seizure, but it turned out that the defibrillator was shocking her. When Jenna sat back up, Lisa said the paramedic tending to her was shocked – by her grit:

“He said, ‘Honey, this makes grown men cry!’

“And she said, ‘I just feel like I got kicked by a donkey.’”

After that, Lisa said, “She rolled along great.”

She led her Miamisburg cross country team to a Greater Western Ohio Conference championship her senior season and she prospered even more at Wilmington until that fateful final race.

The night before – as they often did before events that would require early wakeups or strenuous efforts – Lisa picked Jenna up at the college and then drove to the race separately from the team.

They ate at an Italian restaurant on the way, checked into a hotel, and eventually said their back-and-forth good night prayer. The next day Lisa helped Jenna get through her usual morning cobwebs to get ready.

As the race was nearing completion – with Jenna leading once again – Lisa suddenly heard the numbing words: “Runner down!...Runner down!”

“I just knew it was Jenna,” she said quietly.

Papaw, who had been waiting on the sideline, hustled as fast as he could to his seizing granddaughter and stroked her blond hair as he pleaded, ‘C’mon Jenna girl! You’re alright! C’mon Jenna.”

Lisa said Danelle Readinger, the coach of the Saint Mary-of-the-Woods team and an ER nurse, ran to give aid, as well.

Eventually Jenna was given a heavy dose of valium to stop the seizures. She was unconscious when she was taken to the local hospital, Johnson Memorial, and eventually she was transported to the neurological ICU at Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis.

Jenna remained comatose in Indianapolis and soon there were signs her liver was failing.

On the night of Sept. 2, Lisa said the surgeon who had been scheduled to work on her daughter came out “so defeated.”

She said he told her: ‘Your daughter’s brain is swelling. I can’t do surgery because if I do, she’ll bleed out.’"

Just as she was getting this news, two dozen members of the Franklin College team showed up at the hospital with a box filled with gifts for Jenna’s recovery. One runner, Allison Zorman, brought a check for $1,500 she made selling shirts on the Franklin campus.

Lisa said she told her brother: “I can’t talk to them now, not after this news.”

He insisted she could, and she did and she said it lifted some of the darkness from her:

“I went out there and it was like looking at the bright colors of springtime. There were all these young men and women dressed in bright colors, and they were full of hope.”

Lisa, from whom Jenna had inherited her kindness, asked them about their running. It provided a moment of escape and then they hugged and prayed and she told them, ‘Jenna is in God’s hands now.”

Jenna died the next day.

There was a gathering on the Wilmington campus and then the Quakers runners all came to Miamisburg for another memorial at the middle school.

Coach Ron renamed the annual Fall Classic at Wilmington, The JennaStrong Fall Classic, which, by the way, will be run this year on October 17.

Two years after Jenna’s death her grandfather – who had worked 31 years at Chrysler in Dayton, while wife Carole worked at GM – died at 74.

“He didn’t die from a broken heart,” Lisa said. “But he did die with a broken heart.”

Straight to the heart

After that meeting a year ago, when Lisa feared she had overshot – she said, “I beat myself up, thinking I needed to do more, needed to do better.”

It took her friends and her family and some unemotional self-appraisal to realize she had not failed anyone:

“I came to peace with the idea that this attempt didn’t define me. I realized my greatest gift, the best chapter of my life, had been Jenna.”

So many other people saw that as well – especially Jerry Scheve.

As Coach Ron surmised, the day he made the true-but-not-so-tender observation – “You way overshot” – it was meant as a test.

He wanted to see their commitment.

He did and he saw much more than that, as well.

He saw a mother’s love for her daughter.

“The day I walked out of Methodist Hospital after getting the devastating news, I had my head down,” Lisa said. “I felt like I’d just been run over by a truck.

“From the baby’s book where I’d chosen Jenna’s name, it said it meant little bird.

“That’s why my brother said, ‘Look up, Lisa! Look up!’

“And up there in the sky, thousands of birds were swooping up and down making the infinity sign. That’s when I knew Jenna was with the Lord.

“For Jerry’s funeral I sent flowers, and after that they sent me a thank you note telling me how happy they were about the running center.

“It was written on robin egg blue paper, and it had a bird on it and hearts just like Jenna used to draw. That card is on my mantle now.

“It reminds me just what a miracle this was.”

Lisa now realizes she didn’t overshoot at all.

She finally had gotten the opportunity to tell her story to someone who could make it happen and she had made the perfect shot.

It had landed straight in Jerry Scheve’s heart.

And that’s why they’ll break ground next spring on The Jenna Parlette Running Center which will include the prominently displayed motto:

“Run with your legs;

“Win with your heart.”