Cross Country Decision

In everyone’s life, whether you are in Pre-K or Pre-Calculus, we will all have to make a decision that we know deep in our hearts will determine what the future holds. Mine was my decision to join the Cross Country team going into freshman year of high school. At first glance, it may not seem to be a major decision but if you dig a little deeper, it will become clear that this was in fact a huge choice that would determine my future in high school. In the final weeks of eighth grade, my first plan for the 9th grade was to join the Roswell High School tennis team when January came around, which to me involved training over the fall months. But then, my mother approached me saying that I must play a different sport in the fall, her reasoning
being that tennis is not a fall sport. I was very reluctant to this decision, one because of my 4 year long commitment to tennis, and two, I did not know if I could succeed to the level that I had with tennis with any other sport. So, as a stubborn teenger, I disregarded my mother’s request for weeks, until I realized that she meant business and was not letting this go. So I decided that if I were to play any sport in the fall, it would be Cross Country, due to a friend highly recommending it to me. When my mother and I discussed this, we agreed that if I wanted to, I could balance Cross Country with tennis. It would later be discovered that I would essentially wipe tennis from my brain. The first day of spring conditioning, I met many of the returning runners while doing a routine 20 minute run.
They were very welcoming towards me and made me want to come back. I went home that Friday describing to my mom how much I enjoyed it, while also feeling proud that I might actually have a better chance at succeeding at this sport than tennis. Going into the summer, I drastically decreased my tennis practice attendance, due to my increased attendance at my cross country practices, only attending around 9-10 tennis practices while attending 60-70 Cross Country practices. As I traveled with the team to their yearly camp in North Carolina, tennis became one of the things I thought about the least, but still in the back of my mind I strived to keep the feeling alive. I realize now that I just did not want to give up something I had worked on for years and years. It had become something of a relationship to me, and Cross Country was breaking us up. I feel that the quote by Rick Godwin describes this feeling, and perfectly outlines what I now feel towards this sport, stating that, “One reason people resist change is because they focus on what they have to give up, instead of what they have to gain.”. I would eventually have to accept that I’m most likely not going back to tennis and must do what I feel is best for
me. When the official Cross Country season had begun, I was well molded into the team, and had become good friends with most of the 100 people on the team. I discovered in our first meet that I had a good chance of eventually becoming varsity material and for the first time in my life, I really felt like I could do something amazing if I put my mind to it. So I then decided I would put most of my athletic focus to running Cross Country and making varsity next season. When I made this decision, I realized I would have to run Track and Field if I really wanted to succeed, which began in January, right when tennis began.
I then said to myself that it's ok to leave things behind. I said that I have more potential and fun with Cross Country, and that instead of focusing on what I had to lose with “quitting” tennis, I’m going to focus on all the wonderful friendships and experiences that I have to gain with this sport.