Life Force

Life Force

The diabolical scheme of the atmosphere was succeeding and I was helpless. I was dying from the exertion of my physical strength. The relentless ball of hydrogen loomed over me as I kept on whilst trying to convince myself I could indeed outrun it if I tried hard enough. Ha! Foolish fantasies, they were one of the only reasons I had ever even attempted this task. They kept me going, inside and out. Those inspirations led me to believe and think that I was actually accomplishing something other than my own death.

The truth was that I had never done a thing like this in my life. I never was given reason to and I didn’t want to waste my time – perfectly logical reasoning. And yet here I was, drowning in my own sweat and gasping in the dry oxygen around my body. It was torture and all to win at something that I was no good at in the first place? That made some sure sense. Was there even anything worthwhile at stake? No, there wasn’t; there was only the bitter possibility of disappointment. Some might have called me crazy, others would have preferred to use the more polite word: determined. Although in the end it really made no difference how you said it; crazy was crazy.

Cruelly my psychotic mind pushed my body towards and passed its limits; I wobbled to the left, to the right and then back to the center of my track. The battlefield now looked more malevolent than I ever dreamed an object of its caliber could. I glared vehemently at the green, blue and brown colors that were swirling around my body, silently cursing their existence. A thin line of red interrupted their now unintelligible brown color.

Throbbing shot throughout my left leg as I kept up my pace. I truly had lost it, blaming it on the heat seemed only natural at this point in the game. As more and more viscous purple liquid erupted from the wound, I winced, determined not to think about it. I quickly tried to busy my intelligible mind from the matter as I observed how much farther I was expected to go. As expected, I still had quite a ways to go, and it was starting to seem as if time had come to a halt.

I closed my eyes momentarily desperately hoping to relive myself of the colors of my surroundings. Instead I was met with bright flashes of orange and then blue when I squeezed my eyes shut tighter. They were almost refreshing; the dull blue and light orange colors which met my darkened vision seemed to have a healing effect – on my mind at the very least.

My body was as caustic as ever, I could barely convince it to move let alone turn a corner and I was trailing behind. The game was almost over and that one fixation, the item I wanted so badly to achieve was slipping slowly through my nearly numbed fists.

I ground my nails into the skin on my palms, it wasn’t fair! It just wasn’t! Why should someone like her be able to outdo me in everything? Pain was now surging unprejudiced throughout my body taking care to light every muscle on fire. I ignored it, focused more on my rant then my physical surroundings.

She was always better than me at everything, even the things I was deemed to be half decent at! Then again, I laughed at my antics, I never really cared enough to do better than her. Why should this situation be any different? I always hated running anyways, why would I want to do something I hated for an entire track season? I thought it over and came up with the logical answer: I wouldn’t.

So then why was I here putting myself through this torture? I pondered that one for the longest time and the only idea that occurred to me then was this: I wanted to make the team and I didn’t care how I did it. As the hot hydrogen ball of gas shot my body with rays, and the sweat stains aided its cause, I remembered the day’s events.

The track team had been full and I hadn’t made it (big surprise there). I was then informed by the coach that there was still one position for which no one had signed up. The one hundred and sixty meter sprint was without a runner. Unfortunately, my present opponent had also been informed of this. Interestingly enough she wanted the position too and unlike mine, her reasoning made complete sense. She liked running, she ran for fun and she was way faster than I was. My chances should have been eliminated right then and there. Unfortunately, like few other teachers I’ve met, he believed everyone should be given the chance to humiliate themselves a second time (as if try-outs weren’t enough).

My bones gave way, my head began to spin and my mind gave up the ghost. Suddenly I was a heap of dust and earth; I had forfeited my last chance to win the game. I was out of the running, literally and my mind could not seem to forgive my body for letting up. A forfeit was the coward’s way out, the voices said, you gave up! You could have gone on; if you had, you might have stood a chance at winning!
I almost screamed out loud in protest at the voices, but decided to let the world live under the delusion that I was still sane. It was then that I heard a shout, looking up I watched my opponent veer across the finish line, only ten meters away from where I fell.

I simply stared at the people congratulating her for a few moments; my mind was either shocked or completely frozen up in time. I didn’t seem to want to believe what had just been said to her. It was as if the entire world had broken apart and I was in the middle of it; in the eye of the storm. I was unable to comprehend what was going on around me; unable to feel anything but hate towards my body. What had happened to it? Where was my in endurance when I needed it? My thoughts seemed to whirl around and around inside of my head as I stared with lifeless eyes at the near perfected scenario. A tear dropped from my eye; one lone tear, which to the grass and sky said it all. Turning from my place inside the track, I pushed my aching body up and darted for the gate, ignoring all sounds of protests behind me.
Well, if I were to take one lesson from my failure as a track student, it would definitely involve the sentence: Dare to dream, but learn to face reality. Meaning you should know your limits, don’t expend too much energy on a project that will do little for your person in the long run.

I should know, it’s happened several times and yet I never seem to learn my lesson. I suppose some people are just put on this earth to be examples of what not to do. I’m beginning to think I might be one of them, but I’m not entirely sure, not just yet.