welcome to new beginnings with karen dell and i'm so pleased to have joining me carol think claire who is an amazing woman and you're going to hear her journey moving from education to athletics coaching carol welcome thank you for having me carry us so tell us a little bit about yourself and your journey because we're going to get into some other kind of controversial issues that are hot topics now but it's good for the viewers to learn a little bit about you karen i was born and raised in princeton and so i had a very good education in the public school systems my parents were pillars in the community and my mom was on the school board my dad worked at princeton university when i was twenty two after i graduated from college to get my degree in education i pursued getting a job like everybody else on but i also was an athlete from time i could walk for the much i was shooting baskets or playing with the ball or playing field hockey and basketball and everything  softball i played sports all the way through high school all the way through college wonderful and at twenty two there was nothing to do and i was absolutely outdone because i was an active person and now there's nothing so my father hadn't introduced me to tennis of course and i decided i was going to teach myself so i i didn't have any money of course you graduated from college you have no money you have no money you need you know money i was very fortunate oh my my experience was a prince university because daddy worked there they paid tuition if you went to an accredited school so that's how i got to go to college i i then started watching tennis on t v and by watching tennis on t v i started to really figure it out because of all the athletics i had done i started to coach myself so i would take a bucket of balls a rocket go across the street where the community park courts were daddy had helped build those chords so i went there and i would serve and i would practice and practice and practice they were free to the public and then i would come back i would watch more on t v and then i would go back out to the courts and i would emulate what i saw there was a gentleman an older gentleman his name was mr buyer jordan and he'd been a tennis pro with eve craft for many years so i would be out there and i'd be practicing and  giving a lesson then any take communion and i would go over to him and he would say i want you to do this and then he and shumi away then i would work would double hard to make it work and once he saw that i had mastered it he would give me another tip and then i'd master that and finally it took me a number of years to figure it out somebody mentioned to me i was teaching this at lewis clinic in school for dyslexic and  and a gentleman came up to me and said we were at the tennis courts and said he wanted to hit with me he knew my dad the name was jack isel so i was hitting with him he was just coming off of a knee problem and he said  know you'd be a great tennis instructor and i looked at him and i said can you do that really that i didn't know was a thing so i decided i would go he gave me the name and number of people in hilton head dennis fan amir and i called down there i got the book and i started to figure out how to teach myself how to be a tennis destructor while so at forty five i decided its and i had no idea that the from twenty two to forty five all the practice all the work i'd put in would actually give me a position to be able to instruct tennis wag no idea i just love the game and love to play right so i just kept going i got my certification i've been offered my services to princeton tennis program and what was interesting is the guy that interviewed me was not certified as a tennis instructor  did well for a while then an athletic director at princeton high school whom i knew our john king member whose last name he called me and said i need a j somebody else i met on the train going to the u s here i was going just to watch the tennis she was an african american woman from washington d c her name was doris harrison and we met on the train because she was wearing a hat with all these tennis pins or it so we went up to the and she was a volunteer she was going to the dinner she tracked me down at princeton tennis pro create home and had me go to the tennis symposium they have in hilton head south carolina where i got sort of far she then a year later called me up you the u s g a president judy levering asked her to be the captain of the out the a gibson cup for the international tennis federation what so she called me which was a surprise and said carol do you want to come and help me with the team ah i was out i was outdone and i said where and when because when you find opportunities if you're going to do something new or have a new beginning then you must be willing to walk through the door absolutely you have to walk through the door the door was presented i walked through the door so the first the first one was barcelona spain so we stayed in a house and on top of the hill seeing barcelona it was the royal crown polo club that we saw that we played at it was all clay courts on that it was fun it was great we didn't bring back the cup that year because there was one woman that did not like doris and she threw the match on purpose now these are women that are seventy years old wow and ken seriously if the wall i would warm them up they would we would talk about strategy  talk about different things the next year it was a two year commission the next year we went to south cape town south africa for the i t f and that was a joy to that was fun amazing grace the whole tournaments stopped and was watching the two of us and wow it was so much fun but these people know how to live they know how to to do think something spontaneous and be ok with themselves not be upset not be angry none of that just go with the flow of it and the europeans really know how to do that and so i have i just went with the flow of it right and we did bring back the affiant gibson cub that's one decade down south africa and they asked me to sing because they'd heard me the year before but i said i would not saying unless somebody from south africa sang also so it was really fun though it was fun i learned a lot and the seventy year old women were absolutely marvelous they were marvelous they had such energy they hit the ball so clean they were and they told me they were there i was fifty at the time zero they told me you need to come on the tour and i said well when i'm finished eating tennis then i'll do that but it was hilarious and then i became the varsity say that's wonderful god gave me a real good resume absolutely absolutely no that wasn't your only certification oh yeah because golf is your other game i guess at sixty two my father was an offer dad was an avid golfer and he would take your money any time he didn't have any trouble at the one thousand nine hundred you were playing by him drinks ok that's exactly who he was but he played golf for more than fifty years so when he passed away i decided to take a couple of lessons in golf and see if i had any ability in golf so at sixty two after playing for about five or six maybe seven years i decided to get certified and go off to i said dad i would love that if you had to go to florida i actually did it online i was very very lucky i didn't have to i didn't have to travel om what was really interesting is i had to say that answers over on line all on the phone ok and for me it was truly a spiritual journey and the reason i say that is because the gentleman who took my application on online in our had to call him whose name was robert my father's name a called him abi and the gentleman that took the information for the test his name was robbie so they were all robert's so i consider a three full chord and not be no i said i have to get one hundred and so i answered the last question he said well you will be the only one way to get a hundred and the reason is everybody stops at nine i see and i said no to my father's watching me right there's no way he was an athlete but at his time frame he was not allowed to play yeah back in the one nine hundred thirty s forty six he was in the last to play yeah they they had a real color issue with athletics and sport so one of the things we wanted to explore is what is happening because activism legs is not new you know jesse owen went to hitler you know went to germany and competed in one you know i'm blanking on his name i think his name is joe johnson was a boxer back in the just a little tasty tidbit daddy went to the olympics in one nine hundred seventy six he was the first african american u s trainer wow to go they petitioned prince university people and the people of princeton petitioned many times for him to go so he did go in one nine hundred seventy six to montreal canada i was fortunate enough to go and see him there in that venue are he met jesse owens just to let you know at the white house that particular here oh me because hitler snubbed him in the united states right it was very interesting that he would be there at the same time as my way but he's not the only one know almost every african american athlete era as we can take a look at there's going to be at least one or two right that have stood up you talk about the fists that were that were done you talk about jim brown you talk about and even politicians you talk about musicians  like city portray same thing one of the things you think athletics doesn't have a a very big role but it does so yeah things like be like mike things like that from michael jordan  in that time frame it was it was revolutionary it was groundbreaking book i think the thing that the phrase that always caught me was when sydney says to his dad dad i'm your son i love you you think of yourself as a colored man i think of myself as me the problem with this country is that they always want to think of us as colored men or black men or negro men or african american men and their problem is why are you putting a color in front of who i am i am a man i am a woman i am a person that's who i am but in order for you to see me that way that means you have to see yourself that way no better no worse and that is an issue that we have are still struggling with today when caprona decided to take a knee yeah om it went ripples around the round the world our our forty fifth president has mentioned the fact that it goes against the flag where in fact the second stanza refers to the slaves that fought in canada for freedom from the french because they wanted to take over canada those slaves were set free by the canadians because they were fighting for the canadians to be free people the reason the slaves left this country was because they were treated unfairly at that time and were treated as property now we are still treated as property but it's economic property economic property what does that mean that means you have the money whether to say whether or not i'm going to have a livelihood when they bombed the black wall street in one nine hundred twenty one in oklahoma oklahoma when they made that decision because black people were actually buying selling and having their own of everything the white person couldn't handle at that  moment so they decided to go in and destroy a tells you something about our country and that doesn't go back to slave tunnels that goes back to nine hundred twenty one yeah and that's the bottom line you are afraid because you don't feel you will have enough the bottom line is we all have enough god has created for all of us to have more than enough but not to be opulent with it to have enough to enjoy the pleasures and fruits of our labors but when you stop a people constantly stop a people from succeeding financially  then you think of them as less they think of themselves as less and their subliminal tapes are in the putting you watch t v shows i'll name a few hallmarked does not do enough african american films they do not do enough with hispanics and they always give the leave role to a white couple or white people they never give a lead role to a black person or a hispanic person or a chinese person they have a problem they're not the only channel but if you go back i go back to the sixty's where i was raised i only saw white legs in the department stores for stockings ok and american and so they acted as if i never wore stockings they acted as if my money wasn't good enough to buy stockings and they acted as if i was less because i too would want to buy those stockings i remember very distinctly hanes a store that is no longer in catalogue there was not a person of color in the catalog and i picked up the can a long walk to to the president's walked it to the president s secretary and office and said please do not ever send this to me again and she said why i said because it there is no person of me in it therefore you're telling me you don't want me to buy anything at this store  that's what you're saying you're not saying it outright but you're saying it it's implicit instead of exploits it exactly and that's what's that's what's happened to our country and it's constant and what i don't think people realize is african americans are under it every single day when i think actually there's an increased awareness true and that's where black live matter has come up absolutely  and you you know there are some coldish in building happening to increase awareness and i think that you know collin kapur nick who was an athlete that was doing a silent and you know muhammad ali back in the day was very vocal well but that was his that was dial but but collin kapur nick just as the athletes in the i think the late sixty's who won the olympics they just raise their fist absolutely also silent but initially he sat and then he took the knee because the knee is more of what happens when you're being respectful to a downed teammate and so  the the narrative around him taking the knee was that he's disrespecting the flag right and i have a feeling you don't agree with that well i'll tell you what he did which i think know a lot of people don't know he sat down with a veteran i don't member his name i just saw it on on facebook he sat down with a veteran to have a conversation in the veteran actually had the conversation with him and he the veteran was the one that told him to take the knee and it was more respectful because it's used as a prayer it is used as respect for all to the veterans so that's one changed from sitting to taking any because he took the advice of this veteran because they actually had a dialogue and that is what starting to happen more so today  dialogue started many years ago at different segments of law of our country but we keep edging closer and closer to a better world is what we're trying to create  we are creators god made us all creators if we would but listen to the fact that we are all created equal it's not separate but equal it's called equal in the eyes of god there is no color barrier there is plenty of color but no barrier correct ok when i did a little research on cap and nick with the flag  there is a code a chapter ten code in regard to it the flag should never cared be carried flag or horizontally and how many times do we horizontally put it on a casket put it on the ground of a game it shouldn't be done that way but that's disrespectful of the fly the flag should never be used as weary health care are betting or drapery and yet you have seen that many times the flag should never be used for advertising purposes in any manner whatsoever how many times do we do it for memorial day weekend sales columbus day the presidents day how many times to use a flag in a disrespectful way it should be not be embroidered on such articles as cushions or handkerchiefs and the like how many times do we see it on a bandana on a hat embroidered in many ways or otherwise impressed on paper napkins or anything that is designed for the temporary use of to be discarded these are the u s flag code chapter ten in our government or in our constitution and we're not paying any attention to those disrespectful of the flag and yet when capra nick decides to take a knee he's called disrespecting the flag right but the interesting pieces is that capper nic not really disrespecting the flag now he's actually using the platform of that ceremony when he thinks most people would be paying attention to address a whole nother issue his issues are injustices for all exactly according to the national anthem it states that we have justice and liberty for all which is incorrect we do not and it something that we aspire to do it is the ideal and yet we are not doing anything about it let's talk about the refugees let's talk about the immigration laws let's talk about puerto rico even if we really want to get real close to ourselves and they are our country and according to the senator which really gave trump an ear full i'm not too long ago in regard to her country which was invaded by the united states the entire arm of the congresswoman yes because a vast and we are not obligated to take care of them even though we invaded them and took over their country how is that american how is that justice for all how is that liberty for all and we took their country over they didn't ask us to come over they never did hear i think will hurt her to your point she was making a rebuttal to his statement i think most people recognize that there is an obligation and you know that in many cases the forty fifth president is not as aware as he needs to be because he referred to their governor of puerto rico as their president so you know well being aware is one thing and i don't think he is i think he's an intelligent man but i believe he has lost sight of what his office is to be and he thinks he's trying to run the country like he would run his own business but it's not his business this country is based on democracy and no way have we gotten to where we need to be absolutely not are we on the road there i believe we are  how far along the road i don't know specifically but i do know that with capra nick with i saw young people taking in the playing d f m i hadn't thought that that was it was really interesting that the young people are understanding what kaplan is talking about i think is the conversation right so this conversation is help draw awareness to it absolutely and we are fortunately are out of time but i  thank you for being on for educating us about the the code for the u s flag number ten because some of these things i didn't know and i just you know looking forward to your journey for twenty eighteen me to transition is a very interesting process and transition is amazing because you don't know what god has in store for you but your job is to be flexible and to be spiritually connected to that absolutely well thank you carol for joining us and thank you for tuning in to new beginning