2 months later...

This week is my first week in two months that I'm not riding a bus packed full of sweaty teenagers, trying to bust out some encouraging notes for the girls ten minutes before I leave, or packing a bag full of clothes to keep me warm in wind and sleet and enough gluten/soy/dairy free snacks to resemble something that I can call "dinner."  In other words, the high school track season is over for the high school team.

2 months ago, I went to practice for the first time as a "volunteer assistant coach" for the high school track team.  I was so excited because it was a sweet opportunity smack dab in the middle of what was otherwise a pretty crappy time.  On my first day, my hs coach said the distance runners were doing 6 800s.  He took the guys and said "The girls are all yours, good luck!"  I have to admit, I was a little intimidated at first.  Okay, really intimidated.  High school girls can be scary.  There were only 5 distance runners on the girls team and I just had to tell them what to do, time them, and get them through the workout... but it was still scary.  3 of them were in tears by the end of the first workout that I was there for, and 2 didn't even show up.  I was afraid they were going to hate me forever, even though I wasn't the one who decided what workout they were going to do.  For a while, I was pretty sure they did hate me.  They didn't seem to like running very much, so I really didn't think they'd like the person who told them to run everyday either.

I started doing everything that I could think of to get them more excited about coming to practice.  I looked up all of their old results, bribed them with ice cream (that I still owe them...), taught them form drills, video taped, gave them notes before each race, and made an attempt to run their cool downs with them if they were all alone.  Sometimes, I thought it was going to be a lost cause.  They just didn't seem to want to be there.  Then, a crazy thing started to happen!  First, one girl kept PR-ing her 1500... over... and over... and over.  She wasn't the fastest girl on the team, and she didn't get to go to sectionals, but I was freakin' excited.  Then, a few of them started to get excited about form drills and watching themselves run on my camara.  They were actually getting EXCITED about something!  After a few weeks, I was starting to get to know them really well and I realized that high school girls aren't that scary after all... at least not these girls.

I really wish that I had pictures from the season, but I was too busy yelling things like "I told you to warm up for 16 minutes! You were out for THREE!" and freaking out about things like them showing up at the starting line without their shorts on under their pants.  Just to give you an idea of what they were like: I was working up in the press box for the last two meets and they all came up to talk to me after their 4 x 800 at the League meet.  I was doing awards, so I showed them the ribbons that they were going to get  for coming in 3rd place, but they said that they wished they came in 6th place instead because the ribbons were purple.

No, they weren't the fastest, most committed, or most talented group of girls, but it was a blessing to have the chance to be so excited about them that I'd forget that I was even sick.  God works in crazy ways.

Oh, and by the way, they came in 6th place in the 4 x 800 at Sectionals.  I couldn't help but laugh when I stuffed four purple ribbons into the Chittenango envelope up in the press box...