"Fun" Run

“On your marks, get set,” is all I heard before the loud roar of a gun went off, startling me and leaving a ringing in my ears. I started jogging at a normal pace, and I was in the middle of a huge crowd of about 500 kids. I thought about this morning, when my mom woke me at about 6:00 A.M. on a Saturday. She asked me if I wanted to go on a fun run because my brother was doing it. I grudgingly went along, because it was better then going to work with my dad.

Soon, I noticed I was near the front of the crowd. I was running right near a group of kid athletes wearing matching shorts and sweatbands. At this point in the race, my feet, with incredibly heavy skate shoes that could have caused an earthquake measuring 5.0 on the Richter scale with every step, started to hurt badly. At this point, I was thinking, “I should have just gone to work with dad, at least it would be better then the 20 years of foot therapy I would need after this, heh.”

My feet were hurting so badly, I just wanted to get it over with, so I started running as fast as I could. I noticed I was passing groups of matching-short-and-sweatbands people. As I was running, I suddenly became really hungry. I thought of that barley-breakfast consisting of half a cinnamon-toast waffle and tiny pouch of OJ in the car on the way to this race. I was also thinking to myself,“Hey, I’m running pretty fast!”

I was near the head of the pack, turning a corner, and I saw the blue mat that indicated the finish line. Sweat was dripping from my face as I was making the final push for the finish, passing a few people on my way there. I glanced at the scoreboard. 25TH PLACE! Dang, I never knew I had all this potential! Suddenly my feet had stopped hurting as my mom embarrassed me with victory screams. Her face was glowing with joy and she was jumping up and down with joy. Thankfully, I felt more pride at what I just did then embarrassment. And to think that just that morning I had planned on being a couch potato all day.