Mexico

As you all may or may not know, on Tuesday this spring break, I am going off to Mexico, where for the first time in five months, I will finally be able to play golf. Thank God. For the past week I have been dreaming off, spacing out, continuously lost in thought over the vacation. Golf is one of my great passions, and the thought of finally being able to play it consumes my mind and my thoughts. It pervades my dreams, and I can visualize myself playing golf at any given moment. Trying to write about the wonders of the game and the great time I will have in Mexico won't do any justice to the vision I have in my head, so I decided to draw it out:

*erhm* *cough* ...WELL THEN, I hope that my...umm...truthful* depiction of golf has some meaning to you now. However, I of course will verbalize it out for those of you who may not appreciate my art as much as I do.

*warning- may not be truthful

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I take a deep breath, inhaling the honey-sweet air of the golf course, and quickly exhale. I kneel down near to the ground, picking out a few blades of the dark green grass and, in an attempt to analyze my situation, I let go of the grass, seeing where the wind will take it. Immediately the grass floats out of my fingers and drifts out to my left. Eastward. I look to my right, and for a few moments I take in the beauty of the majestic Pacific, which is crashing into the rocky beach far below. The deep blue ocean pleasures my eyes for a few moments, but then my head swivels back left, to the green about a 150 yards ahead. It is oddly-shaped, the flagstick jutting out on the very right side of the green, the red flag blowing about, the wind gently tossing it from right to left. I loosen myself once more, rotating my head along my shoulders, and I am ready. I pull out my eight-iron, and take a few gentle, loose swings, my focus on the left side of the green, where I want to aim the ball. Stepping up to the ball, I begin my backswing, my eyes now facing the ball. I then bring the club down with speed and fluidity, and make contact. Click. Beautiful. The ball soars up high in the air and, as if hesitant, wobbles down and bounces onto the green. I have to shield my eyes, the bright sun still beating. But I'm still happy. I pick up my golf bag, and with confidence, I fix my divot, and walk towards the challenging, yet inviting, green ahead.

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Well, I think that went pretty well. However, I still enjoy my picture better than I do my written out version. *Sigh*

A fine balance

I have no idea how this works. First semester was filled with sleepless nights, impossible lab assignments, in-depth essays, tension-filled studying sessions after golf matches. It was filled with stress, and sleep was in scarce quantity. Now though, I find that I can sleep at 9:30 most nights without too much tension. Nights in which I have to stay up until 2:00 AM are incredibly uncommon, and life has become much easier. Is it because the golf season ended long ago, and now I have much more free time on my hands? No. Track consumes most of my after-school time, meets lasting up till 9:00 PM. My time before school is non-existent, as I go to 6:00 AM practices, forcing me to wake up at 5:15. Then is the workload decreasing? No, definitely not. Labs attack me constantly and homework and tests are ever-present. Do I have a study hall? No, that was replaced with a web design class. Then what happened? Have I gained time? The fact is, I don't know. My grades for some reason are still in tact as I juggle several difficult courses with greatly limited time. However, it may be my laziness getting to me. Coming into the first semester, I had an intense need to do extremely well in all my courses, but that desire is completely out of my system. Now, my easier courses, such as spanish and global studies have become less of a problem as I discontinue to study for the tests and quizzes and continue to do well. My more difficult classes, english and biology, still are highly prioritized though, providing me with healthy amounts of homework.

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My bio teacher told us today that to be successful is to be able to do well in school, while keeping our lives stress-free, with free time and a maintained social life. This freshman year has been treating me well, and I pray that I will also remain successful in that same way my bio teacher wanted us to be.

Postmortem

I am drowning. At first, the water is refreshing, cool. And then, the realization sets in. Being in the water for so long, I have dropped down too far. Looking up, I see a small glint of light, and around me, a darkness pulling me down. My arms and legs thrash about me, but it is too late. I am too deep in. My lungs are at its bursting point, and eventually, I am forced to exhale my breath forcefully, the bubbles of air, floating free to the sky. I scream and thrash, scream and thrash, but the glint of light grows smaller as I continue my descent down. My head is pounding and finally, I am forced to breathe in the cold, unforgiving water. My lungs scream out in pain, my entire body in convulsions of agony. Each movement of my arms and legs becomes weighted, and eventually all movement stops. In anger, fear, and pain I scream, in a last act of desperation. But it is too late. The light has disappeared, and no voice emits from my burning throat. I am alone, dying the worst possible death anyone can go through, next to a crucifixion. My brain cells are dying in scores as my oxygen-deprived body screams out an indescribable anguish, in defeat. Suddenly, it is over. The darkness overcomes, and death overtakes my body and my soul floats out of the water.

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Suddenly, the Mexican music pounds into my left ear as my alarm clock blinks: 6:00 AM. I slam my radio off, as I stumble out of bed and into the shower. It's a Monday, go figure.

Pushing oneself

The 600 meter dash: a 3 and 3/4 lapper that requires of the runners a kind of mental toughness like no other. Over a quarter mile, the 600 is an all-out sprint amongst those with a good combination of speed and stamina, but those who have both, but do not carry the extreme mental task of forcing oneself beyond physical limits cannot make it, cannot succeed.

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"Aw, dang it!" I exclaimed. I clutched onto my left knee as I attempted to straighten it out. Only a close minute to the beginning of my race, the 600 meter dash, I wasn't in good shape. Out of a combination of both nervousness and of working oneself too hard earlier in the week, my knee suddenly began hurting. The referee placed each one of us in our lanes and explained the mundane rules of running and indoor track. I looked around to find a group of large freshmen and sophomores, being that both grade levels were put together for this specific race. I gulped. There were several runners from other schools, and Niles West only had three participants in this race. The referee backed off several strides, and began the ritual for beginning any race by taking out his starting gun:

Ready...Set...

BANG!

I got off to a terrible start. My bad knee, coupled with my deer-in-headlights fear of running the race brought me into a terrible start. The first five strides consisted of limping awkwardly. I was in last place out of eight or nine participants. Seeing the large group of runners ahead of me, I pushed as hard as my legs could take me.

Two laps into the race, and I wasn't doing much better. Although passing up a few people, there was still one specific runner just ahead of me. My sweat dripped down my face, and my breathing was shallow and racked with difficulty. I had already run out of energy, and still there was over a lap to go. I began to cough as I ran, my throat dry. My legs began to slow down, atrophied and done out. The runner ahead of me was beginning to speed up, pumping his arms and legs quickly. Bystanders and teammates were cheering on, yelling loudly for their favorite runner.

Suddenly, all sound stopped. Only less than a lap to go, the only sound being emitted was my breathing and footsteps. The cheering voices of my friends and teammates drowned away, the yelling of coaches drowned away. The track became near silent. The runner ahead of me was several strides ahead. I began to "kick it in," ignoring the pain, and forcing myself to go at an all-out sprint. My arms were pumping wildly ahead as legs were speeding up. A wrenching cramp formed up in my abdomen, and the sweat was dripping off my nose. I was gaining on him. I merged into the second lane from the first, and pushed myself even beyond the threshold of my speed from before. It was the last quarter lap and it was a battle to the finish. I had beaten him. I had won.

I received 5th place, but the satisfaction that ensued far outweighed the glory that comes from even getting in 1st.