Sports and Student Athletes :: Dialogue Conversation Essays

Student Athletes My alarm woke me up, screaming incessantly in my ear. It was eight o'clock Saturday morning, and I felt like I had fallen asleep only a few minutes earlier. I rolled out of bed onto the itchy carpet and somehow found my towel and shampoo in the darkness so I could drag myself to the shower. As the steaming water helped wake me up, I began to think about the day I had in front of me. "Here we go," I thought. "I better make it through this one or I'll be in serious trouble." It was the 27th, and in under an hour I would be in huge gym with hundreds of people taking the SAT. A mere two hours later, I would have to row my first 2k erg test of the season. My new coach from Germany would be standing over my shoulder, and I knew that those seven minutes would have a huge impact on whether or not I would make the varsity boat that spring. I could not help thinking about how important this day would be for me as I saw in my mind the e-mails from Dartmouth, Harvard, and Brown asking me about my times on the erg, which would determine how much interest they would take in me. Last minute thoughts on standardized test strategy swirled through my head as I tried to eat my quick breakfast of toast in the dining hall. Micah tried to talk to me about what we would do that night, but my mind was in a haze as I tried to focus on the task ahead. His voice was just background noise, an every once in a while I would nod me head and appear interested in what he had to say, but his words didn't register in my mind. Before I knew it, we were in Ridgedale. The long rows of desks stretched out before me, and I felt overwhelmed by everything going on around me. I sat down and refocused, realizing that I was getting over-excited about nothing. I tried to calm myself down, but I couldn't help worrying about doing well on the test and proving to everyone around me that I deserved the scholarship I had received to this school.