The Dead Dream

18 days. After almost 4 complete years of being on the cross-country team, I am down to only (at least) 18 days. I am trying my best not to think about it. But it's seriously freaking me out.

Running has always been the one thing I could count on. I remember in 6th grade when I tried out for Rhythm Express and I didn't make it. After crying my eyes out to my Mother when she picked me up at the front of the building, the first thing I did when I got home was change clothes, put on my sneakers, and go for a run. Running just seemed to release all my anger. For some odd reason it was the only thing I could think of doing. And it makes sense doesn't it? I didn't want to face the loss of my 6th grade dream so I literally ran away from it. Well, what do you do if you lose a dream in running? How can you run away from it, when running is the dream?

Ever since the end of last cross-country season, I have had one goal in mind: make it to regionals my senior year. It is my last opportunity, and really the first opportunity I've ever had at making it to regionals. My times are finally getting close to being fast enough. And I know I deserve it. I have worked my butt off since last season, and there is no one who can say I haven't. I showed up to every single winter conditioning practice. I was the only one who did 800 repeats with coach Meiser (I should note Hannah was doing them too until she got hurt), while everyone else went for a regular run. I have done everything to try to make myself a better runner. From giving up soda, to taking ice baths, to reading Runners World like it's the Bible, to asking my coach every possible question I could ever think of, the list goes on. I finally said to myself last year, "From now on I'm going to give running my all. I'm going to work my hardest and see how far I can really go." And I have impressed myself. I dropped about a minute in my two mile time, and I never thought I would even run the two mile. I have proved to myself just what I can achieve when I put my heart and soul into something. Well now I've got my heart and soul into running, and I'm not ready to let go.

I will be seriously disappointed if I don't make it to regionals. No, take that back, I will be devastated. After working so hard to not even make it, I don't know what I'll do with myself. I want this so bad, I don't think I've ever wanted something so bad before. And I'm not trying to sound egotistical when I say this, but I know I deserve it. I deserve regionals. I just have to prove it to everyone else.

The only thing worse than losing regionals is the one thing I'm going to lose regardless if I go to regionals or not. It is losing cross-country. Losing my team, my coach, my running. Sure, I can run on my own. Enter myself in races, set my own personal goals just for the heck of it. I could even run in college. But it can never be the same as to what I have here, right now. For once in my life, I am perfectly content with what I have. I am happy to have the life I'm living. I would seriously never trade this for anything else. Three years ago I would've. Three years ago I would've been happy to be going off to college, leaving my friends and family behind, starting my own new life. But now the time has come, and I'm not ready to give it all up. It's like there's something else here that I just haven't learned yet. There's more for me to gain, more to understand, more to live for. I have been dreaming of the chance to go off to college. For the first time in my life, that dream is dead to me.

I want to say there is a way that I could make this work. A way to have the best of both worlds. To have college and what I have here at the same time. It seems like mission impossible, but I'm praying to God there is a way that it will work. Nothing is impossible for God. I'm just not sure if what I have in mind for my life is the same God has in store for me.

I won't lie, I feel so disconnected from God right now. I don't know what He wants for me in life, but I think half the problem in that is that I don't even know what I want in my life right now. I don't know what to look forward to, what to hold onto. I just feel so confused. I've always known what I want. Why is it now that I can actually take the opportunity to get what I want, that I freeze like a deer in headlights? Another problem is because I feel so guilty when I talk to God. I'm so desperate for answers but I'm not listening to what God has to say. I'm only thinking of what I want God to say. And trust me, there is a huge difference between the two. I trust God, but I think that I'm scared of what God wants for me. Just like a parent, I feel like God is being over protective, trying to keep me out of harms way. I understand that, and it should be a comfort to know that, but at the same time it's not. You learn a lot from what you go through. I would rather learn something very important, even if it hurts me, than to remain naive about it because I'm protected. It's so complicated. God is so complicated to me. Trying to understand it all is just too complicated for me.

I want to be this young woman who can represent Christ and bring others to Him, and while I can talk about God, I feel like I can't set the example. I can say, "Do this, do that" but I can't do it. I just feel like the biggest hypocrite. Like tonight at church, someone said something about how I'm probably as perfect as Christ or something (it had to do with this grading card thing). They don't understand all my flaws and sins. I'm great at trying to be a certain type of person, but I'm not really like that. I know I'll never be perfect, but trust me, I know there's much for me to improve on, that people, even my closest friends, just don't know about. It makes me sad that people don't realize who I really am.

"And I don't want the world to see me/because I don't think that they'd understand/when everything's made to be broken/I just want you to know who I am".