“I’ve good news and bad news for you!” Have you heard that before?
There is the story of a preacher who announced to his congregation one Sunday: "I have good news and bad news. The good news is, we have enough money to pay for our new building program. The bad news is, it's still out there in your pockets."
Or how about this, with a mind to sport? The good news is that your women's softball team finally won a game.
The bad news is they beat your men's softball team. Lastly, a man was in the hospital with two broken legs when a nurse advised him that she had good news and bad news.
He asked for the bad news first, so she said, "We're going to have to remove your legs." So, the man asked for the good news. "The guy beside you wants to buy your trainers."
Today we will consider some good news and some bad news by looking at three stories that were reported on the BBC Sport website within three days of each other this month, each relating to the truth of the headline of this article. For each of them, “the unimaginable happened”, as it was described for one of them. Let us start with the bad news.
Thirteen years after being given less than a one percent chance of survival when she was hit by a car while out jogging, 28-year-old Leonie Harm won her maiden Ladies European Golf Tour title with a one-shot victory at the German Masters.
Incredibly, despite severe brain injuries and multiple bone fractures suffered in the accident, resulting in her being put in a coma, she returned to the golf course just seven weeks later.
Soon after that she won the National Women's Amateur title, as well as several other amateur titles (including the Ladies' British Open Amateur Championship - the world's oldest women's golf tournament) before she went to the US to study biochemical and biophysical Sciences at the University of Houston, prompted by the loss of her mother to cancer.
At times, after turning professional and coming close to winning on several occasions, she considered quitting the sport but she persisted and now she has won her first professional tournament. The unimaginable happened, both good and bad, the wholesome victory after the horrific accident.
Then there was an interview with Jonathan Gjoshe, a 23-year-old young man living his dream, playing for his first soccer club, Scunthorpe United, when on a train journey home (when he normally went by car) he was one of eleven people attacked with a knife, sustaining seven wounds to his bicep, shoulder and arm, narrowly missing a nerve in his arm.
After months of rehabilitation, he suffered further disappointment when he learned that the club was not going to retain his services, yet through it all he has remained positive. He had worked hard to get his big break, having spent years playing lower-league football in London, jumping up four tiers in the football pyramid, having been named his club’s Young Player of the Year award. But the unimaginable happened.
What then of the fairytale story of Antoine Semenyo? In 2018 he was playing on loan at non-league Bath City but recently he scored a goal-of-the-season candidate while winning the Player of the Match award in the illustrious FA Cup Final victory after being transferred from Bournemouth to Manchester City earlier this season. As he commented: "As a kid I have always wanted to be playing for the top teams - it took a long time to get there, but I am grateful." The unimaginable happened.
Harm was quoted as stating that “I didn't have to be miserable… Resilience was the key.”
She learned that we need to be patient, we need to forgive self, we need to “be your own best friend” in such circumstances. She understood that anything can happen. Good and bad can happen. Similarly, Gjoshe stayed positive, rather than moaning about his disappointment.
"Listen, it's happened, it's life, thank God I'm alive. You've only got one life. Anything can happen… So, you've got to make the most out of it." The unimaginable happens. Children need to learn such key lessons through sport.
Which do we want to hear first – the good news or the bad news? We might wonder which also comes first, the good or the bad? Does it end up a fairy story or a horror story? We might just be tempted to resolve as Lawrence Welk did: “There are good days and there are bad days, and this is one of them”. Whichever it is, we need to remind our children that, no matter whether we are doing really well or struggling to achieve anything of significance, anything can still happen, good and bad.