Sunday, April 17, 2011

Today was the Regional gymnastics meet of my old teammates. It's so weird to think that about a year ago, I had one of the best days of my life... and that it all ended. It's weird knowing I haven't done gymnastics in a year. I still have mixed feelings, and I think I always will. It's hard explaining to people without sounding like "oh man, gymnastics is life or death, it's so intense, it's THE biggest deal in the whole world." It's not like that, it was my life though. I'm not going to lie. For the people that knew me well, they knew it consumed me. It had to. I wanted it to. So it's hard sometimes not having it. I still think about it all the time, every day. How can I not? I was in the gym always. It wasn't just some random sport I did for fun, as odd as that sounds. It's just what I did, it was just in me. And not doing it for a year has definitely shown me things. I never thought about it while I was doing it but I think in a lot of things you have to take a step back to learn from it. I learned patience, even though it's still not one of my strong suits. I had to learn to respect people who didn't even respect me. It is really hard to keep your mouth shut when people are pushing you down, but you had to. That sucks. But I learned to be the bigger person. I learned to stay true to myself, when everyone else was different from me. I had values, and I kept to them even if they thought I was weird. I mean, it didn't really matter, everyone loved me more that those other girls anyway. I was nice :D
I went through a lot of things many teenagers my age didn't usually go through. No, I didn't have anything horrible happen, it was just gymnastics but still. When most people try hard in life, it pays off somehow. USUALLY. Don't get me wrong that's not always the case. But with gymnastics, you can work your ass off all year, and one centimeter to the left on a beam can throw it all down the drain. And that hurts. Way down deep in your stomach. And I'd sit there crying, wondering why I couldn't be great, why I couldn't stay on that damn beam, those bars, that floor. I deserved it, I tried, I wanted it but I couldn't grasp it until the end. But I think that made making Nationals all the more special.
I went through a lot of physical pain too. But again, people go through pain in sports all the time. I'm just saying it sucked when you straddled a metal beam twice in a day. After that, some things just aren't nearly as bad. And when you have to walk on a broken ankle because no one cares enough to carry you. Yeah that makes a stubbed toe seem nice. Of course I didn't see that then, I see it now though. And it makes me miss it. I miss being unique. I miss having something special to cling to. I miss not having to wonder what I'm good at or what I do. I don't know what I'm good at, or what I like doing. It's scary, I'm still figuring it out. But gymnastics taught me a lot. I'm glad I did it, no one else has a story like mine.








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