I somehow got myself dragged into running cross country this year. Don’t get me wrong, I like playing sports. I played basketball and ran track in middle school, I just wasn’t planning on playing sports this year. The first time cross country was brought up was near the end of my 8th grade year. A parent knew I liked running and that I was going to be in high school next year, and they wanted me to try it out. “You should try it,” she told me, “you’ll really like it! I think you’d be great at it, too!” “Eh, I don’t know,” I said, “I generally run shorter distance events” “I still think you should try it out. The coach doesn’t care if you're fast or not, he just wants you to improve on your personal time!” She seemed determined to join the team next year.
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I was approached pretty much every day after that, at least for a couple of weeks. Each time, I said that I would consider it, even though I had my mind set on not doing it. I started to feel guilty after a while, setting their hopes high, when in reality I wasn’t even thinking about it. I completely forgot about cross country over the summer vacation. It wasn’t until a few weeks into school that some members of the team approached me about it. I met the coach and some team members, and they told me what it would be like. That’s the first time I really considered joining. They kept asking me to join, and I didn’t know whether I wanted to or not. They offered for me to show up to a practice if I wanted to see what it would be like, so I said yes. After I got changed and put my shoes on, we met up outside. “Today won’t be anything serious,” said the coach, “we won’t be running laps around the track or anything, just a casual run to the bridge and back. About 4 miles.” 4 miles? I was in shock, he said. I was expecting a mile, maybe 2, but
I was approached pretty much every day after that, at least for a couple of weeks. Each time, I said that I would consider it, even though I had my mind set on not doing it. I started to feel guilty after a while, setting their hopes high, when in reality I wasn’t even thinking about it. I completely forgot about cross country over the summer vacation. It wasn’t until a few weeks into school that some members of the team approached me about it. I met the coach and some team members, and they told me what it would be like. That’s the first time I really considered joining. They kept asking me to join, and I didn’t know whether I wanted to or not. They offered for me to show up to a practice if I wanted to see what it would be like, so I said yes. After I got changed and put my shoes on, we met up outside. “Today won’t be anything serious,” said the coach, “we won’t be running laps around the track or anything, just a casual run to the bridge and back. About 4 miles.” 4 miles? I was in shock, he said. I was expecting a mile, maybe 2, but