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. You ve bought so many thingshere over the years, he told her. You re not paying today. An-other parent, standing nearby, hears the story and says, I ve beenbuying stuff in that store for twenty years and I ve never seen himgive anything away to anybody. Even in a small town, there arestill surprises waiting to be sprung.It s a grayish day, another winter day.The rain will come first,later this afternoon, and then the temperature will drop all of asudden and the snow will fall in majestic, king-size flakes of white.It will ultimately be a wonderful day to stay indoors.But for nowthe sky is dry; and the volunteer fire trucks are waiting down atthe intersection; and it is time to take a ride, because that s theway it gets done here on the day after the State Tournament.As the cars begin to roll down the country road, they switchtheir headlights on.The windows of the vans and trucks have beenpainted with enough slogans and signs to make it clear what shappening, with congratulations to the wrestlers and listings ofthe weight classes, and kids popping up through the sunroofs ofsome of the trucks and vans, waving huge foam-rubber fingers atpeople, screaming out into the cold air to no one in particular,which is good, since we are in wide-open country.At points all along the road, though, there are cars idling indriveways pointing out toward the road, the people inside themkilling time reading the paper, waiting for the parade.When theprocession finally comes past, they honk their horns and wave,and then they fire up their motors and fall in line, and the wholegroup heads down toward Troy Mills Road and the waiting firetrucks, which then switch on their flashing lights and crank upthe sirens and lead the ride through town, around through thecity blocks, honking and waving at whoever is willing to comeout into the cold February air and wave back, which, it turns out, Making Things Grow / 237is just about everybody old men, little girls clutching disposablecameras and standing in their front yards, people waving hand-made signs lettered with slogans such as dan leclere 4x statechamp and way to go state qualifier ryan!.They come out intotheir cold yards and shout a greeting, and the kids sticking out thetops of the sunroofs shout and wave back, and the parents honktheir horns; and then some of those people hop in their cars andrace ahead to the North-Linn School, headed for the gymnasium,just ahead of the victory parade that makes its way eastward toCoggon before looping back and coming to a rest in the highschool parking lot, having touched all the bases.Inside the building, the entire left side of the bleachers isfull.There are the usual bunches of parents and friends, of course,but also wrestling fans, and fans of the kids in general, and peoplewho love the community and feel like celebrating after a hardride.The little school pep band fires up the North-Linn fightsong, and, as if on cue, a couple of hundred people rise and beginclapping along.The team, the coaches and the parade are actuallystill en route.It doesn t matter.You stand for the school song.And then it s time for the program to begin, and one byone the coaches are brought before the crowd, the waves of ap-plause washing over them first Brad, and then Larry, and thenDoug, and the middle-school coach, too.And then the boys arecalled, each in his own turn.There is state qualifier Ryan Mul-nix.State sixth-place winner Ben Fisher.State fifth-place win-ner Nick LeClere.State third-place winner Tyler Burkle.And thefour-time state champion, Dan LeClere.It is a huge, huge roarfrom a small crowd, which makes this, officially, a Class 1A mo-ment.The entire field is made of programs like this, programs thatare run almost completely by handfuls of people who won t letthem slip away: moms and dads who work the concession standsand take the tickets, and drive everywhere and bake the stuff forthe fund-raisers.From where they sit it is a long, long way to the 238 / FOUR DAYS TO GLORYkind of money it would take to build that new wrestling room.But those somedays have a habit of coming around.You just waitlong enough, and work.Bridgewater offers his congratulations to the kids, eventu-ally bringing the entire wrestling program, varsity and JV, downonto the floor.With North-Linn having finished fifth overall inClass 1A, he says, We didn t come back with the team hardwarethat we were looking for, but we re on our way.We re makingprogress. North-Linn has sent five kids to state, come within awhisker of sending another (Shannon Hocken), and might witha touch of luck have gotten Madison Sackett there, too.Thereare all sorts of encouraging signs.Despite the massive hit thatthe Lynx will take with the loss of Dan, this is clearly a programpoised to do good things.North-Linn was a legitimate contenderfor one of the team-title placements in Des Moines until thesemifinal round.As it was, the team finished just 4 team pointsbehind third-place trophy-taker Eagle Grove.Now consider TylerBurkle returning, and Nick LeClere, provided he can get throughfootball season in one piece.Consider that people like Ben Mor-row and Madison and Ryan and Wes Ward all will be a year betterand healthier, and Mason Cook, and Andrew Happ, and Luke Ben-ning, and Kirk Schmidt.Add in Chris LeClere, ready to inherit thefamily legacy, and Alex Burkle, for whom Doug has such hope.It is a group ready to continue making North-Linn a pro-gram to be reckoned with.Bridgewater can see that, absent Dan-ny, his team may not produce the kind of individual firepower ithas had over the past couple of seasons, but as a dual opponent theLynx are going to be deep and good.The future, standing herelooking straight at it, is legitimately bright.There is momentumat North-Linn again.Momentum for Dan, too.And it is clear, as each boy is askedto speak, that Dan himself is perhaps the least emotional aboutseeing his high school career in the rearview mirror.He just can t Making Things Grow / 239bring himself to think of it as anything other than the beginning,and maybe what makes Dan the kind of winner he is is the factthat he whirs to the cadence of an inner clock that no one else canhear.Dan wanted to be a four-time champion, dreamed of it.Hevisualized it, of course
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