“I believe you should follow your emotions,” says Suzana Majcen, a starter for the Varsity Blues volleyball team.”Follow what you feel and go by your instincts.”

Majcen has been true to her word. After all, it was emotions that made her leave Storje, Slovenia, at the age of 18, with her soon to be Canadian husband, her heart drunk on love and her belly swollen then with her son Michael, now 12. It was emotion, too, that made her decide to return and complete her final year of eligibility with the Blues, four years after graduating with an Engineering degree in 1999.

It is a fitting coda for Majcen, an instantly likeable person, who has managed to outgrow her small village of 400 to experience a narrative of abuse and personal setbacks-and hopeful recovery.

“I was five months pregnant when I arrived. I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I didn’t know whether I was going to go back. [But] I ended up staying to see how the relationship would go,” she says straightly.

There were intimations of possible trouble: his hard drug use, his questionable past. She knew of these. But that was the past and his world was different from hers, she says-his history more a story and less fact. “I just knew what I felt when I was with him, and it was good. What was the past I didn’t pay much attention to.”

The past, however, has a way of transforming painful memories into an ugly present. The relationship would unravel soon after Majcen began Grade 12 at Wexford Collegiate.

“He had mental problems; he had manic depression. So it was really up and down. When I went back to school he was feeling really threatened. He never finished school and he felt I was surpassing him. We talked, but our relationship was never highly intellectual. The way he was, he didn’t want to pursue anything.”

Physical abuse soon led to sexual assault charges and two years of prison. She recalls feeling seized by tension whenever she recognized a man of his likeness walking down the street. Dogged by heart troubles, he died in 1997. She felt mostly sorrow and little else. It would be her and Michael from then on.

But there was help to be had. Majcen gives much credit to Blues volleyball coach Kristine Drakich. “Kristine did so much for me. She knows what you need and finds it for you.”

Majcen recalls her time juggling school, varsity volleyball, and Michael, as hectic. “It’s all a big blur,” she says with a smile.

Volleyball entered her life at 12, playing in the streets of Storje. “Volleyball has always been part of my life,” she recalls while describing her active childhood.

After spending her first two years on the bench, her third season at U of T appeared to be a breakout year. Her game was improving and many starters graduated, leaving room to play. But an errant landing tore her left knee ligaments two tournaments in-a potentially derailing blow. Regardless, Majcen finished her final year as a starter, a year she describes as “amazing”-the team winning OU’s (provincial championships) and making CI’s (national championships).

The memories of that year lingered well past her undergrad days. At AT&T, where she now works, thoughts of returning to complete her final year of eligibility grew insistent. A talk with Drakich last winter convinced her to return. She wanted to improve her mental game. It was now or never.

Today, she starts for the Blues, working strongest as a left-side striker. Majcen may be years older than her teammates, but is their equal in spirit and athleticism. Last weekend at the U of T National Invitational, she led the Blues in scoring in a set against semi-final opponents York, and played strongly against Winnipeg in the finals.

Right now, Majcen couldn’t be happier. “It’s awesome. Kristine’s style-I can see how much better she is as a coach. She sees what everyone needs, what we’re lacking, what we need to work on. I’m really happy because I’m getting what I came back for.” The team, she says, is the strongest she’s ever seen.

Come March, her days as a Blue will come to an end. Feelings of sadness? “No, not sad!” she says. “It’s a fact: no one plays more than five years.” Given her on-court smile, she’s just happy to be back.