Cleaning Up

Tom Treweek is looking for feedback on a story he wrote about a town's volunteerism after a January ice story : The lunch line backed out far into the gym at the activities center. About two dozen restaurants had donated food from hot dogs to barbecue to salsa.

After a hard morning's work, lunch was a time of rest and storytelling.

Cameron Godsey was there because the Heritage High School football team was there. Actually, almost all of the athletes from both Rogers high schools were there. Godsey and his teammates spent the morning clearing lawns around Lake Atalanta, where "Coach Block," defensive coordinator Jerrod Blockburger, had run the chainsaw and ordered his players around like it was a football practice. Godsey said the work wasn't nearly as hard as a practice.

But Raymond Coat isn't an athlete. The sophomore just heard about it in class and wanted to help. He seemed to take the morning's work in stride, but he wasn't used to the coach's motivational techniques.