Taylor mentored Colo. shooting victim

DAVE MOSIER/independent editor

Van Wert native Natalie Taylor has the kind of job Colorado shooting victim Jessica Ghawi dreamed of. In fact, Ghawi told her so as Taylor, a sports broadcaster for the Columbus Blue Jackets, was leaving the Pepsi Center, home of the Avalanche NHL hockey team, to catch a plane to the next Blue Jackets game.

“As I was walking out of the Pepsi Center to board the team bus to head to the team plane, a young girl asked if she could talk with me,” Taylor said. “She was clearly waiting to meet me because, she later explained, I’m one of the only female broadcasters in the NHL and that’s exactly what she wanted to do.”

Taylor, daughter of Don and Deb Taylor of Van Wert, said Ghawi asked for her contact information and said she wanted to stay in touch so she could ask questions about Taylor’s career.

The Van Wert native said she was impressed by the young woman’s desire for a sports broadcasting job.

“You could tell how passionate Jessica was about her future,” Taylor said. “Not only did she approach me on her own, which speaks volumes because I was surrounded by players at the time, but that didn’t even faze her. She was just excited about sharing her career goals with me.”

Hearing Ghawi’s excitement about sports broadcasting also caused Taylor to reflect on her own career. “Walking away from her, I definitely had one of those moments where I’m reminded of how blessed I am to have the job I do, because her enthusiasm about being a sports reporter was contagious,” she said.

It wasn’t long before Taylor heard from Ghawi, who also used the professional name of Jessica Redfield during her budding career as a sports blogger and broadcast intern.

“Like she said, I received an email from her a few weeks after our chance meeting,” Taylor explained, noting that the two women exchanged emails throughout the summer, with the Van Wert native responding to Ghawi’s last email last Tuesday — just two days before her life was ended, reportedly by shooter James Holmes, in an Aurora, Colo., movie theater complex.

Taylor, a 2000 graduate of Van Wert High School who has been a sports broadcaster since her graduation from Bowling Green State University eight years ago, has covered everything from Southeastern Conference football and basketball for Fox Sports South, to NASCAR with HDNet and, before her job with the Blue Jackets, high school sports and the Ohio State Buckeyes for WSYX/WTTE television stations in Columbus. She said she tried to pass on the lessons she had learned during her sports career to Ghawi.

Taylor said that, in Ghawi’s last email, she asked about the difficulties of being a female in a male-dominated world, and how to handle certain situations.

“A portion of my email back to her was as follows: ‘be patient, work hard and stay focused … it does get better,’” Taylor said. “I never got the chance to hear back, but I hope that, in some small way, I reminded Jessica that she could accomplish anything despite the struggles she may encounter in this career field.”

Unfortunately, the Van Wert native said, it was Ghawi’s death that reacquainted her with some of life’s tough lessons.

“I’m the one who was reminded of the bigger lessons in life: it’s very fragile, to be thankful for each moment we have and embrace our life to the fullest,” Taylor said.

While she said it is a tragedy that Ghawi didn’t get to realize her dream of being an NHL broadcaster, Taylor said she, personally, is a better person for having known the young woman who died on Thursday, and has emailed Ghawi’s brother to share her thoughts of his sister with him and the rest of her family.

“Jessica was a very driven, enthusiastic, passionate young lady who wanted so much from life,” the Blue Jackets broadcaster said. “I had a chance meeting with an aspiring journalist and she thought I was helping her, but it turns out she helped me.”

Taylor said the tragedy also point out the impact of such acts on all of us. “While it may have occurred in a different part of the country, it shows a tragedy like this really does impact people all around the country … including Van Wert,” she noted.