10.00
I feel chalk on my hands, but slowly starting to feel sweat in my palms. I keep spitting on my grips then rub them together, as if it’s going to change anything. I am so distracted by all of the noise, I try to block it out buy humming to myself, it works…..but only for a couple minutes. “I’ve done this before. I’ve done this before.” I tell myself as I pace back and forth on the blue matt. My heart is racing and I haven’t even done any type of physical activity yet. I grin though because it’s the only thing I can do, at this once in a lifetime opportunity. I’m trying to look on the bright side of things, ya know? The glass is half full, live life to the fullest. All that crap. The only thing that is really getting to me is all the noise; I wish I could just shut off my ears. My eyes I can close or even look down. But I’m not really sure I should cover my ears for the whole world to see. My throat is also bothering me a bit, ahhh so dry. I walk over to the fancy Gatorade station, I find it ironic that this station is advertising Gatorade and inside the green water bottles is nice cold water. I take a sip and it seems to clear my throat and it kind of wakes me up too, I take another sip then start chugging the water down my throat. It’s so cold but not too cold were it gives me a brain freeze, it’s perfect, one of the very few things that is perfect in this atmosphere, I appreciate it a lot. I see my coach, the one thing familiar in this foreign place. All my focus is now on him, my eyes ask him for help, for comfort. His eyes tell me that I’m okay and not to worry. But the noise! I feel the Grinch hating all the noise, noise, noise. I try to make out a few voices in the massive crowd to find out what they are saying, and what do know they are speaking in a different language, this calms my nerves a little. “Hey!” my coach calls out to me “Stay focused.” I look at his face closely; he looks like a wreck in a jumpsuit. Eyes bulged out of his head, his face dripping with sweat and his comb over doesn’t look all that hot… but I guess it never did anyway. Although I do love this rush I want to cry and run off the matt. It’s all so huge, it’s all so intense and it’s all too real. I keep thinking back to my gym and how conferrable I am there, and how much time, energy, blood, tears and buckets of sweat I’ve put into that place. In my head I think of how ‘everyone is watching me’ not just my friends and family but the whole word. Some people are hoping for my best and some are hoping for my worst. I don’t necessarily feel pressure from anyone, but I feel loads of pressure from myself witch is far more intense. I gaze up slowly at the surrounding crowd, I feel like a baby bird in a nest. If I don’t perform fantastically it won’t be a tragedy but if I mess up horribly it might as well be hell. The crowd is a big colorful oxymoron. They are here to support but doing the exact opposite. I walk past ‘Germany’ a gold medalist two years in a row on bars. Oh this is probably just like another practice to her. As I walk by I can feel such a strong tension that I can just see her ripping the United States flag into fifty little pieces. Before I have a chance to say anything to her; unfriendly or nice we are already ten steps away from each other. Now I’m just waiting for her to grab my perfectly in place pony tail and yank it to the floor. Maybe this gymnastics competition will turn into a UFC fight in the blink of an eye. ‘What are you thinking?’ I ask myself then kind of laugh I think these nerves are making me go crazy, thinking about fighting this girl rather than competing. “You’re up!” my coach grabs my arm and pulls me over near the judges. “Hello,” I say nervously, wondering if they can ever understand me. I study the first judge she is old, maybe in her late 50’s she looks foreign or at least to me she does, she looks pretty unfriendly too in her ugly blue vest. She grins at me, I can’t tell if it’s evil or not. I look at the other three judges all male, all bald, and all foreign too. One of the men says “Good luck,” in an accent but I’m not sure what kind. I smile again and walk away to my gym bag. I slide off my thousand dollar red, white and blue warm ups. I try to think back when I’m in my gym doing what I do best, “I’m a great gymnast,” I tell myself over and over again. “I’m a great gymnast and this is my best event, I can do this,” I tell myself once again. I close my eyes and somehow block out all of the madness and noise I am trying to find my ‘Happy Place’ like in the movie Happy Gilmore. I stop at the chalk station on my way over to the uneven bars, spraying water then rubbing chalk on my grips. I slowly but confidently strut to the spring board; I salute to the judges, walk onto the spring board then jump.