Personal Reflective Essay: Climbing Hills

Climbing Hills

Summiting the infamous Spark Hill, I hear the heavy breathing of four runners and the grinding of loose gravel beneath aching legs. As the course levels and veers left between the boys and girls dorms, I accelerate into the lead. Not one hundred meters later, I question my bold strategy. With still over a mile to go, my body tells me that it’s feeling a lot of pain. I decide to push even harder, for this pain is nothing compared to the pain that woke me up one night during spring break my Junior Year.
After a gradual build up of symptoms and discomfort, I received the diagnosis that I had developed a Staphylococcus aureus infection in my lower left lung. One of the symptoms of this rare strain of pneumonia, besides fever, sore throat, and night sweats, I would discover, is pleurisy: inflammation of the lining of the chest cavity. It started with a strange slight throbbing of my ear, then a sore shoulder, and finally the most excruciating pain I can imagine. I woke gasping and half expected to see a large gash beneath my lower ribs and an exit wound in my mid back. Moaning to myself with tears boiling in my eyes, I tried to muster the air to call for help. Movement intensified the pain but I finally crawled to my parents’ bedroom and my dad rushed me to the ER. Heading up I5 in the middle of the night, I cursed the demon that was inside

me, because I knew it was destroying everything I had worked for.
That coming track season was my opportunity to run fast.

I had emailed college coaches in the winter and had been told the times they were looking for. I had to cut big chunks of time, so I set my sights high. With guidance from my coach, I bought in to a training program and started logging the hard miles; I often left school early during my free period to run workouts with friends from another school. I was all in. Although I wouldn’t call what I was doing a sacrifice, because that implies that I lost something, I would call it unorthodox. I knew my lofty goals deserved unremitting persistence, focus, and

passion.
After recovering from being sick, I optimistically tied my red and blue spikes before my first 1500m race of the season. Hands on knees, I Looked up at the scoreboard after the race and saw my time was thirty seconds slower than my PR set that winter. I could feel my eyes water with disappointment as I warmed down, but I blinked them away and forced a forward facing smile. Though demoralizing at times, having to slowly and patiently build back my aerobic capacity, I eventually worked my way back into shape. At the end of the season, after placing sixth in the state meet at Historic Heyward Field, I knew I was not finished. The first day of summer, I decided to once again, with a reignited flame and newfound tolerance for pain, go outside to run.
So as I round the final turn, remembering to pump my arms and bring my knees high, I see my family, friends, and teachers cheering me forward. It is my first cross-country victory. Being sick brought me to the bottom of a daunting and demoralizing hill, but climbing to the top, I think I gained something more lasting than a school record. I found the source of my love of running. One day I may be down, but the more hills I climb the stronger I become. Every time I continue to grind and power up hills when the pain tells me no – every time I decide to keep going, I have the opportunity to see what’s at the top.