Personal Narrative: Mite Playing In Hockey

We stumbled one by one onto the ice. the cold air immediately stung my cheeks and numbed my toes. The other players were warming up; effortlessly weaving through cones and performing crossovers with such ease that it looked as if they were dancing the waltz in a ballroom, swiftly gliding back and forth, making sharp and precise turns, before lining up to practice shooting. A wrist shot, a snapshot, a slapshot a -the nets not over there -shot. In the locker room, everyone boasted to each other; “five goals seven assists.”
“I got seven goals and twelve assists” “Well, I don’t mean to brag but I got onto the ice without falling today,” I’d say to myself. I looked like a Mite playing in the NHL. While other players practiced, I still hadn’t figured …show more content…
Other players had years of experience. I still had my dad tie my skates. I joined the team knowing I would not good, but I expected to learn fast and become an essential part of the team. When that didn’t happen, I began to hate playing hockey but I refused to quit. I trained during spare time. After practice, I left the rink drenched in sweat, my face red as a tomato and my whole body so sore it felt numb. Nevertheless, I still lived on the bench during games. After becoming discouraged I contemplated quitting but never did. Three years later and I can finally skate, now I just need to learn how to stop (seriously, I might be wearing pads but those boards still hurt). I’m on my high school's JV team and although my skillset never drastically changed, my expectations did. My failure with hockey has not taught me to stop striving to be better or to lower my expectations for myself, rather it has taught me to change them. I had high standards for the amount of goals I would score and how