The night before State Cross Country Brooke Yardley, one of my coaches, told the girls team about her friend’s daughter named Hazel who had been through two open-heart surgeries and was now just starting chemotherapy. We as a team made a poster showing our support and dedicated the race to her.
When I was younger I used to think that cross country was where you would travel the world and run across the countries. I thought, “There is no way in the whole world that I’m ever doing that.” Now here I am in my fourth year of running cross country, and it is almost as miserable as it sounded back then.
Waking up at six in the morning to go run speedwork in the bitter cold, or running after volleyball practice in the sweltering heat is not what you’d call fun. Cross country is hard and anyone could tell you that. Spectators don’t always see the hard work we put in to be able to perform like we do. When I run there’s also a lot of mental work going on to push myself. Basically if I had a class called Perseverance, that’s what cross country would be.
Running has caused me shin splints, knee problems, and a tired body altogether — not to mention the extreme high levels of stress I go through the day, week or even month before State. My stomach churns every time someone mentions State cross country. The stress before a race is very real to me and sometimes it makes me want to quit because the pressure to be the best is so hard.
We held Hazel’s poster up on the podium after we took State. Our parents took pictures and we congratulated each other. Learning of Hazel and her struggles made me think of how much I take my health for granted, that I can walk and run and eat and sleep and I don’t have life threatening problems that keep me awake and cause me pain.
This article is more about gratitude than anything else. The fact that I can run, I have a strong heart that just beats the way it should and that I’m healthy, is enough for me. Hazel is worried about staying alive and all I have to worry about is running as fast as I can in dumb races that will neither define me nor kill me.
I’m grateful for my life and the body I have and I will try to develop myself, my talents and go as far as I can with what I’ve been given. That’s all any of us can really do. We’ve all been given things to help each other run this race of life. What Hazel gave me was a new perspective on my gratitude for cross country, and I’m grateful I could run for her.
– by Tabetha Henrie (16) Panguitch
Feature image caption: The Panguitch girls cross country team holds up their poster for Hazel, along with their state trophy. Courtesy Becky Henrie.
Contributor
Tabetha Henrie is a contributing writer from Panguitch High School. From time to time, The Byway receives submissions from high school kids, and we almost always publish these submissions. Sometimes the youth surprise us with their ideas, but it is certainly a joy to see what this generation has to say about the world and their place in it.