HILL CITY - Filmmaker Woody Allen once said that "80 percent of success is showing up."

Woody has not met Hill City's Dusty Swanson. For Swanson, just showing up at Hill City High School every day to continue his studies is much more than that just showing up.

It's life itself.

Swanson suffered a debilitating spine injury on Feb. 16 of this year while participating in a wrestling match in Fort Pierre. An unusual and disastrous fall resulted in a crushed disc and a separation between the fifth and sixth vertebrae, leaving Swanson paralyzed from the chest down. Following a four month rehabilitative stay at Craig Hospital in Englewood Colo., a center specializing in spinal and brain injuries, Swanson returned home in mid-June, wheelchair bound and still paralyzed.

Swanson might have been faced with a couple of choices. He could have chosen, as many would have, to feel sorry for himself and allowed others to do everything for him. Or, he could begin the process of redefining himself, building upon that solid core of character instilled in him by his parents, Guy and Andra Swanson.

For Swanson the choice was simple.

He turned to people whom he trusted - wrestling coach and science teacher Chad Ronish, who had always been there with support and happened to be one of Swanson's favorite teachers. And he fell back on the tough lessons that he had learned as an athlete, about himself and the effort required to be successful.

"I liked football a lot, the team thing and being around my friends but I probably enjoyed cross-country and wrestling even more," Swanson said. "Everything is on you. If you make a mistake or things don't go the way you want them to, it's on you and you can't blame it on someone else. If you want something, you have to make it happen yourself."

Step one toward making it happen was listening to those same people.

"When he came back, we talked with him about what he would need to do to catch up in his studies and get himself back on track with his peers," Ronish said. "We also helped him see that despite his condition there was much out there in terms of vocations that he could do, if he set his mind to it. But to do so he would need not only to get caught up but to toughen his academic regimen as well."

In other words, if Swanson was willing to put in the work, the staff at Hill City High School would work with him over the summer so that he might catch up and be ready to start his junior year right on schedule in the fall. No enabling here, just hard work. Swanson agreed, and put in the time placing himself back on track with his junior classmates.

"Dusty is a lot smarter than he likes to let on," Ronish, who is Swanson's physics teacher this fall, said. "It's not always the cool thing to look too smart."

The most difficult aspect of his readjustment to the high school environment was finding an aide with whom he could work. His disability made it impossible for him to complete simple tasks like holding books, writing assignments and eating without assistance. All of the seemingly simple tasks that all students take for granted.

It was at that time that Wade Ginsbach came upon the scene. Ginsbach, a former Hill City student and a recent graduate of Northern State, had come home to spend time with his father, Cory Ginsbach, a former coach and athletic director at Hill City, who had been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease.

Ginsbach needed a position, Swanson needed an aide - a perfect match.

Ginsbach spends the entire school day with Swanson from the time he is dropped off in the morning until the end of the school day and often beyond. Ginsbach assists with the football team after school and Swanson often goes to watch practice.

"I just like to be around the guys and around the game, too, in any way I can," Swanson said. Though the school year is young, Ginsbach has thoroughly enjoyed the partnership to this point.

"We have a lot in common. We both like sports and played sports so we have some common ground there." Ginsbach said and then adds with a chuckle, raising his voice so that Swanson can easily hear the comment. "And we are both chick magnets as well, him more than me," With everything seemingly in place to help Swanson move forward toward his high school degree, does Swanson ever feel sorry for himself?

"Wouldn't do much good would it?' Swanson replies in his soft-spoken manner with just a curl of a smile on his lips.