Cross Country Can Be Too Far

At age seventeen, my oldest sister Liz liked to run. She had more medals dangling from her South High letter jacket than a World War II general. Liz ran cross country. She was, you know, one of those guys and gals who could run for hours at a time with wind to spare. I, on the other hand, would run 90 feet to first base and be gasping. "The Lizard" (as we sometimes called her) was starting to collect medals in just about every event she was running in. A number of college scouts would attend her meets. I remember standing at the finish line, and when I noticed the first group coming around the corner for the home stretch, she would always be there. One day, she made her decision - a junior college in western Kansas. A partial scholarship for running would subsidize her college costs. There was only one problem. The junior college was on the other side of the state, and that meant she would be living on campus. Liz was the oldest sibling, and my father was hesitant about letting her go off to college. His argument was there were a lot of colleges in our area at which she could live at home and commute. But she had her heart set on heading west. After weeks of arguing, my father finally said, "You're not going away for college. I'll help pay for it if you stay in the area, but I don't want you leaving home!" My sister was very disappointed, so much so that she decided to sit out a year from college. She got a job working at a local department store and lived at home. My father would come home from work some days and find her still in bed sleeping at two in the afternoon. He didn't want her to leave; now she was always there. My sister gave up her dream of running cross country in college. Her oldest son turned out to also be a cross country runner and, like his mother, chose to give up the sport. Her second son, Carey, made a name for himself on the state level as a distance runner at Valley Center. He graduated this past May and hopes to run in college. His mother is letting him pick his school.