My new flute teacher and I planned out my summer today via phone call. I hung up the phone after talk about repertoire, technique exercises, orchestral excerpts, competitions, and places to live. I had a mixture of feelings: a bit of excitement, a LOT of nervousness. As I think about it a few hours later, this experience reminded me a lot of my sophomore year of high school:
I never was very good at sports growing up. My three sisters were. But I always went around, assuming I was the un-athletic kid. I worked hard, yet I warmed a lot of benches. I learned in junior high that I was decently fast. That's the only athletic gift I had. I would win some second place ribbons at the junior high track meets, but never any of the coveted blue ribbons.
One day in practice sophomore year, we were running 600s around our football field, and my track coach saw a spark. He approached me and told me he was going to enter me in the 800. I had been racing the the 200, 100 hurdles, 300 hurdles, and 4x400 relay at the time, and here my coach was, telling me to run a mid-distance event! I listened and agreed to give it a shot.
When race day came and the gun went off, I did what I knew best: I ran - hard. One lap, then another. I finished in 2:27 for my first 800. This was state qualifying material for Class D in Nebraska. My coach kept me there! I ended up winning the next meet (districts) and was off to state in Omaha!
I don't remember everything about the events leading up to that race, but I have vivid memories of bits and pieces. I remember sitting at my kitchen table Wednesday (before the Saturday race in Omaha), putting my head down on the table, and crying. Why? I felt so overwhelmed. Here I was, a scrawny 120 lb, 15 year old, the "un-athletic kid," from a place with more cattle than people, and I was about to go to Omaha Burke High School to run in front of thousands of spectators. I had ran the 800 twice.
The other memory I have is from the end of the state race. I'm running, the crowd is cheering, and I'm nearing the final turn. I'm running out of energy, and I'm still overwhelmed. I tripped a little on the railing that lined the inside of the track. And I finished second-to-last in my heat, 18th out of 24 overall.
Something happened the next year. As a junior, I came back more confident, and my times started cutting down, with a peak of 2:21 and a 3rd place finish at state. My senior year, I finished second at state in the 800 and was a mile state champion.
How does any of this relate to where I am now? Well, I feel like that 10th grader, sitting at my table. I feel overwhelmed. I am about to dive into a world that contains a plethora of talented flutists. "I'm just a girl from rural Nebraska," has often crossed my mind. I have tripped several times already and still don't feel entirely comfortable.
The great thing is that I remember what happened after the discomfort of discovering a talent. Initially, I dealt with success by being afraid. Why? Because that success also meant responsibility. It meant believing that I had the ability to compete with others in a higher tier who were also talented. And the better I got, the better the competition got. I had my share of folding, but I also learned that yes, I was able to adjust and become one of the running crowd, to the point of being a leader on a college team.
As I sit here in Nebraska, anticipating what is ahead, I keep the bigger picture in mind. I know that in flute playing, I will adjust and continue to grow. I will become more comfortable in a community of talent and stop to acknowledge that if I made it this far, I must have some talent, too.
The most important lesson, in retrospect, that I learned from my past experiences with running is that, in the end, none of the results from a statistical standpoint really mattered. What did matter is that I pushed myself to be the best I could be, that I used the potential God gave me, simply because He gave it to me. I seek the same goal in music.
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"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the leader and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before Him, He endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." ~ Hebrews 12:1-2
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