Draft #2

Noah Agwu

Maddie Kahl

ENC2135-142

25 March 2018

Personal Essay

In a small corner of a small town there lies an institution by the name of Alexis I Dupont high school. On the campus lies a piece of concrete that has taught me everything about life and made me the man I am today. A concrete slab with a metal ring drilled on top. On the back side of the circle there is a beat up rusty metal gate that surrounds the back half. Looking out to the front there are yards and yards of uncut grass, dandelions, and open field. To the left lies a tree line that displays the beginning of a wooded area. This, sacred ground to me for many years, was my high school discus circle. I discovered this place at the age of 14 when the track and field coach asked me to try throwing discus. Ever since then that circle has changed my life. This piece of concrete made its first legitimate impact on my life at the age of 15. November 21st, 2013, I broke my leg in three separate places at my high school basketball game. I was forced to take a leave of absence from school and when I returned, throwing discus was the only thing the doctors would clear me to do. On April 8th, 2014 I had my first practice since my injury in November.

I was not the same athlete I was before my injury and this made me very angry with myself. I was trapped in a mental and physical battle with my personal standard for my athletic ability. The day became increasingly emotional. “righty foot down faster Noah! Come on Noah you’ve got to get this shit right! Get off your left leg faster Noah, damn it you’ve done this before!”, things I believed to be simple drills where now tiresome tasks exposing a major weakness that mentally I was not able to except. Frustration with myself replaced the enjoyment of the sport clouding my goals and making it difficult to believe in the results I was working so hard to obtain. Being humbled by my circumstances, I processed my weakness and set out to turn them into strengths.

As I got older the dream of a college education seemed to dwindle each year. After my injury in early high school I began to scramble to find any way to get a college education as basketball was my only option at the time. I successfully completed my track season and made it as far as my state competition where I came in second to my brother. The next Monday, at the last practice of the year I stood in the circle faced with a dilemma. I knew if I wanted a college education I would have to put my all into whatever I committed too, weather that be basketball, track, or anything for that matter. I ended up making the best decision of my life choosing to invest all my time training to throw discus.

From then on for the next three years I trained alone and spent countless hours every day teaching myself the ins and outs of throwing discus. There was no coach at my high school so, every day it was just me and the circle for years. Eventually I began to take my personal life to the circle and use it to help me. A lot of self-communication was spoken. Me telling myself what I liked about what was going on both in that moment and in life in general. A lot of discus reps and drills where done, endless in fact. The whole time I heard the satisfying sound of nature. A lot of singing birds, the faint sound of running water from rivers nearby, the sound of animals brushing through the woods, my own yells of frustration were all things I would hear. Always a sense of home was felt there.

All the years of sacrifice and isolation were all for one important competition, the state championship. Friday May 21st, 2016, I departed for the state championship only to be named victor in a few short hours. Later that day, as I returned to my high school as a state champion I walked down to the discus circle to say thank you, thank you for all the countless hours we spent together and to express my gratification. Growing up my siblings and I did not have a stable childhood. My mother was unemployed, never had a job, and my father did not live within 13 hours of us. There was virtually no person in my life outside of my mother that was more consistent than the discus circle. As I stood there alone in my thoughts I swept the circle clean, sat down and spoke a few words of thanks.

“Thank you, thank you for the lessons you’ve taught me and the opportunities you’ve granted me. You instilled patience and understanding in me that I did not see important in my life before we met. You taught me the true meaning of hard work, the true meaning of blood, sweat, and tears. You laughed with me and cried with me. When times got bad at home id come to you, and you where always there for me. For years you’d listen when nobody would. For years you gave me answers to my deepest problems. You taught me life lessons that I apply to life beyond athletics and above all you’ve provided me with a college scholarship and for all this I will be eternally grateful.”

I wiped the tears from my eyes and proceeded to have one last private practice as a high school athlete. As the day winded down I did not, I threw until my fingers burned giving each throw everything I had. As I ended the day I felt at peace and happy with my life at the immediate moment. I proceeded to take my discus shoes off and lace them up at the top of the fence that towered over the back half of the circle as a token of the years we’ve spent together. Turning and walking towards a new life that only the circle and I would understand the tribulations it took to get there.