Personal Narrative On College Football

Gazing across the lush field I lay my eyes on an enthusiastic crowd. Emotional chants rise from their voices but are immediately silenced from my hearing as the referee whistles the ball into play. I bend down to get into my stance, one hand down with my middle fingers balancing me into a running back stance. I feel the sweat dripping down my face and into my eyes causing a sizzling pain that brings my head back into the game. I knew it was only a matter of time, despite that it was only halfway through the third quarter. I had to make the most of the time I had left. Billy, our team’s center, bends down and laces his fingers around the brown leather of the ball and snaps it back. Immediately in response I burst forward running past my defender
The cramps had never been a significant limiting factor in my athletic career until my junior football season. The first game of the season it was at halftime that the cramps hit me, and I was unable to participate in the second half. The second game my body managed to power through half of the third quarter before it collapsed. Now, here in the third game I had almost made it to the fourth quarter before my legs gave out and I couldn’t participate in the rest of the game once again. This was a massive problem because this was the first sport that I had felt a severe passion for in my life, and I wasn’t able to fully participate in it because of my leg issues.
It tore at me emotionally. I had never loved a sport so much; however, this had not been the story of my entire life. In fact, prior to this junior season I had hated football. I hated football so much my freshman year that I choose to quit sophomore year and was barely convinced to come back junior year. It wasn’t until the first day of practice, however, that I realized what a mistake had been to quit. I missed one year’s worth of my favorite activity in the entire world. And now, because of my legs, I was basically missing a second
I still continued to have cramps and wouldn’t often make it all the way through a game. But I now had a different mentality. I came in with happy spirits and played the game for fun to enjoy every second that I could spend on the field. Instead of getting down on myself after the game I focused on the good things that happened. I also and most importantly, started to to put more of a focus on God. Every night I started to read two chapters of the Bible no matter how tired I was. And amazingly, Scripture provided answers for my legs. Scripture provided answers for my hunger for competition. Scripture provided meaning to a life of 17 year old- boy who overstressed himself. And this helped keep me focused on my true goals in