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Sidelines
Kalani Simpson
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Friends and fans come through for Taylor
THERE was a fundraiser Wednesday night at Eastside Grill. Everybody came out. Everybody gave. Everyone felt wonderful for having been a part of it that night.
"Everybody was there," Rainbow Wahine associate basketball coach Pat Charity said. She said it just like that. She meant it literally. Everyone came.
Of course they did. It was for Nevie.
Janevia Taylor was the Rainbow Wahine guard with a vivacious personality and a gritty game. She could light up a defense and light up a room. And in either case, she wanted everyone around her to come with her, along for the ride.
"She is a tough individual," Charity said. "She'd been through a lot, and we watched her go through a lot while she was here and she always seemed to prevail."
She was a senior last season. She went to the mainland for the summer. She was in a serious car accident in June. Doctors induced a coma in order to help her heal. She hasn't woken up since.
"It was very tough to see her in the state that she's in," Charity said.
She is the bubbly one. She is the entertainer. She has a smile like the sun. And she is the one who is so determined sometimes it's best just to stay out of her way.
She was the 15th Wahine to score 1,000 career points.
You can't imagine her like this.
We'd all been hoping for better news by now.
It's toughest on her mother, who has good days and bad. Charity said that Nevie's mom has told her sometimes her daughter will open her eyes when she visits.
But she hasn't woken up.
"I have a picture on my cell phone," Charity said. "We were snowed in in Utah" -- the team was stuck at the airport, bored -- "and she was dancing and trying to get me up and dance." They were all laughing.
That's who she is. She wanted everyone around her to get up and dance.
She's just short of becoming the first in her family to graduate college. Head coach Jim Bolla wanted her to stay in Hawaii to get a little closer, but she couldn't, she had to go home. She was getting married this summer. She had to plan it all out.
The team had met her fiance a few times, a very quiet, very shy, very handsome young man. They were going to start their life together in July.
Instead, now there are fundraisers and prayers. Nevie has no insurance, and the bills are mounting. Hawaii has opened its heart, Charity said. It's been unbelievable. Everybody's been there.
They took in a bunch Wednesday night, there's still money coming in. The super fans who sit under the basket made the most heartfelt sign they've ever made.
There is still the Friends of Janevia Taylor fund at any First Hawaiian Bank, or mail it to the main branch at 2764 Woodlawn, Honolulu, 96822.
Letters, signs, aloha, etc., can be sent to her mother at Friends of Janevia Taylor, P.O. Box 2214, Lancaster, Calif., 93506.
Charity, the coach, is still on a high from the fundraiser the other night. She's still emotional when she thinks about what it was for.
"I remember her mom saying to me last week -- I end up crying a lot," Charity said. "Her mom said, 'When God's ready for her to wake up, she'll wake up.' "