As track season draws to a close, I’m starting to look forward to the upcoming cross country season. Even though we still have one more outdoor track meet, planning for cross country is already in the works. And even though I love track, after two seasons of being a multi athlete I am starting to long for the days when I only have to run one race per day. That’s not all that’s special about cross country though.

First, there is the nature of competition. I’m pretty sure that cross country is the only sport where you can get lost during competition. I’ve heard of teams getting lost on the way to or from games, but never during them. In cross country, where most of the race is run in the woods, without people around to point you in the right way, or, the responsibility falls on the athlete. Competitions take place in some of the prettiest places I have had the pleasure of visiting. Sometimes I wish there was more time after the race to get lost on your cool down and just admire how breathtaking some of these courses truly are. For example, our Seven Sisters competition last year took place on a course that passed by a horse stall. We were asked to not cheer for our teammates too close to the horses or they would get spooked. This does happen fairly frequently, that teammates will cheer for each other during the race, even though they are tired. Many courses loop around several times, so you get to see teammates that you don’t necessarily run with and cheer for them. There’s something about sharing a few strides, a grin, and a “keep it up” that motivates you more than any type of sideline cheering can. That shared moment, when you know the other person understands how tough the course is and how competitive the runners around you are, is something that translates much better in cross country than it does in track.

Second, there is the team. It’s not just about how you treat each other on race day that counts; it’s the other 6 days of the week. It’s the mile repeat workout where you run until your legs are shaking and you just want to sit down, but your teammates drag you out on the cool down run after anyways and tell you stories about their days to distract you from the pain. It’s Friday night dinners before meet days, when everyone is chowing down on pasta and chicken and buzzing about what pace they want to run so this can be their best race yet.

One of my favorite Friday night dinners has taken place in Massachusetts every year since I’ve been a freshman. This is the dinner before the Seven Sisters race. We leave early on Friday morning for the long drive to whatever Sister is hosting it that year. We usually watch an old school movie on the bus; one year it was the Sandlot, one year it was Bend it Like Beckham. Then we have our usual Friday night dinner, this time in an Italian restaurant somewhere in New England. Something interesting always happens at these dinners, because after spending 6 hours together in a bus we feel closer, and despite, or possibly because of the impending meet, there’s a party-like air. There was the time that one of my teammates ordered the largest plate of pasta on the menu. Our coach doubted she would finish the whole thing, and was willing to back up his prediction with a cake. She ate the pasta and the cake.

I’m so thankful for all of the opportunities that I have to share these special moments with my cross country team: to eat with them, laugh with them, sweat with them, and race with them. In cross country, I get to have my family out there on the course with me.

People should become banter bloggers. When I got this job, I thought that it would be a way to make some extra money and an excuse to write something every week. I enjoy writing, but as a science major, I don’t get to write much that isn’t riddled with internal citations. Sometimes I cite things that I write in emails. These are, however, only two benefits to being a banter blogger. There are a lot of unexpected things that happened when I started putting more of my life online.

First of all, professors started reading my tweets. Since the college often retweets what I tweet using #bmcbanter, I would have professors referencing things I tweeted in conversation. For example, I may tweet about something funny my professor said in class, which the college will put on their campus weekly or Twitter account. Then, a little while later, I’ll get an email from a professor saying “I saw your tweet. I’m glad you enjoy how funny I am in class”.

Secondly, my parents find out more about what I am doing. I call my parents often enough, but sometimes I’ll leave some things out. If I write about my adventures on my blog, however, I’ll get a phone call the next day: “Marissa, why were you in New Jersey? How did you even get there? Why didn’t you visit Aunt Karen while you were there?” The blog pretty much allows everyone to keep tabs on me: parents, professors, even my coaches.

Finally, the point of a blog is that you have to have something to write about every week. The idea is that college students are interesting: we live in large buildings with a hundred other people our age pretty much unsupervised, the college spends a lot of time and effort putting on events for us that range from the academically stimulating keynote speaker to pure fun; like the free build-a-bear event (this one is like the real-world Hunger Games). A benefit of my blog is that I’ve started to take advantage of these things in order to have something to write about. The end of the week will roll around and I’ll realize that I’ve done nothing but got to class and practice. In this situation, I’ll decide to go to whatever event has been most publicized this week, take notes, and write a post. I’ve gone to some really cool events that I never would have without the pressure of making my life sound interesting on the internet.

1. Realize pre-registration is a month away.

2.  Promptly freak out and check the tri-college course guide. There are no classes on the tri-college course guide. Pre-registration is a month away, you are being too eager for senior year.

3. Check the tri-college course guide religiously every day until course listings arrive.

4. Make spreadsheets with 3 or 4 possible schedules.

5. Briefly entertain the idea of doing a thesis.

5  ½ . Immediately reject the idea of doing a thesis because you want to have fun your senior year.

6. Get caught up in work and completely forget about pre-registration.

7. Realize pre-registration is a week away.

8. Panic.

9. Hastily make an appointment with your major advisor to get your plan approved.

10. 1 day before your meeting, realize that you probably want to do a Praxis.

11. Hastily make a Praxis plan.

12. Meet with your major advisor and try to present yourself as a functioning human being that is actually not super overwhelmed.

13. Suddenly realize during your meeting that you are going to be a senior next year.

14. Panic.

15. Get caught up in work and completely forget about pre-registration.

16. Realize pre-registration is 1 day away.

17. Panic.

18. Hastily try to finalize your Praxis plan.

19. Have an awkward conversation with the receptionist in the Dean’s office because you have to get your Dean to sign your Praxis plan, but you are also too tired to form coherent questions.

20. Briefly reconsider the idea of thesising.

20 ½ . Instantly reject the idea of thesising.

21. Realize that everything is starting to fall into place at the last minute and you will probably have classes to go to during your senior year.

22. Realize that you are going to be a senior next year.

23. Panic.

I don’t know what happens after this.

One of the things that I love a lot is track. In fact, it is possible that “love” does not even sufficiently describe my feelings toward track. I compete in the heptathlon, and the heptathlon is something that I love, even though it literally runs me into the ground.

As with most things that people love, however, there is that one part of it that I do not love so much. Most heptathletes have that one event where they think “If I could just long jump twice and not do that thing, the heptathlon would be perfect”. For me, that thing is javelin. I do not love javelin.

Javelin looks really cool. When you do it, you get to throw a giant spear around and look like someone from the Hunger Games. Doing javelin is not so cool. It involves a lot of technique, and that is something that is acquired through a lot of practice. I compete in six other events and I have to go to classes though, so I do not have time to practice javelin all day. This is not conducive to being good at the javelin, which means that it is kind of hard to have fun throwing javelin. The days when I have to practice javelin are hard. It is hard for me to stay positive when I am doing things wrong, and I know that I am doing them wrong, but I am not able to fix them. Every time I try to focus on one aspect of my technique, everything falls apart. This makes me throw badly, and this makes my shoulder hurt. It also makes my heart hurt. I want so badly to be good at javelin. One of my favorite heptatletes, the Olympian Chantae McMillan, loves the javelin. I want to be good at the javelin like Chantae. The sad truth is that I am not. It’s hard for me to have a good attitude at practice, and that makes it hard not only for me, but also for my teammates.

I know that attitude is half the battle. In long jump, it’s something as simple as having a good attitude and having the pieces fall together, hitting the board just right and landing a good jump. If you have a bad attitude, you’re a hundred times more likely to foul out. I’ve hardly ever fouled when I have a good attitude going into the jump. I know that the same principle applies to javelin. I decided that I was going to have a good attitude if it killed me.

This is how Javelin Games was born. It’s not as scary/dangerous as it sounds. There are many safe games you can play during javelin practice that help you improve, stay focused, and most importantly of all, positive. My favorite Javelin Game is Leaf Javelin. There are two ends of the javelin. Both are pointy, but one is pointier, and this is the end that goes into the ground. In Leaf Javelin, you stab a bunch of dead leaves on the less pointy end of the javelin (the back end). Then, you throw the javelin like normal. If all of the leaves fall off the javelin during the throw, you win. An added bonus to this game is that there are leaves flying through the air all practice and it feels like fall again.

It’s a simple game, and it’s a little silly, but it makes javelin a lot more fun. Instead of spending practice looking longingly at the long jump pit, I am excited about javelin and ready to focus on the event at hand. I’ve written several times about the importance of focusing on the event that you’re competing in, and only that event, during the multi events, but this applies to practice as well. I can’t be thinking about how much I would rather be long jumping during javelin practice, because this will just make it harder to get better at javelin and make me dislike it even more. Javelin Games make javelin almost as fun as long jump. Almost.