Mile 1
In fifth grade I concocted an in-depth plan to fake sickness and skip my grade-wide mile run, because I felt ashamed I couldn’t keep up with other kids. I look back at that now and smile a bit, one mile is just one third of my warm up. It mattered so much to me that I sobbed a devious confession to my Mom, “Eomma, my stomach hurts” or “Eomma, I feel light-headed”. She just shook her head, smiled and made me eat a banana. How I have grown, and how trivial my worries were! Today, I have laced my shoes extra tight and they feel like wings under my feet.
Mile one feels like“a sleepy summer Sunday and a sweet, untroubled mind.”
Mile 2
When I think about why and realize it was because I didn’t want to look weak in front of the boys, my smile sinks. Little perfectionist me had wanted an airtight persona. If I was the top of my class in ELA and math, how would it feel to be mediocre at best at running as everyone sprints ahead? I imagined them zooming past me, making that whoosh sound effect that they put in cartoons as they leave me in the dust. Embarrassing in bold red letters burned holes into my mind.
Research shows that girls in classes with high-achieving boys tend to set their academic goals lower and lack confidence in their abilities than girls at all-girls schools. Those same all-girls school students are also more apt to perform athletically. When I found that information, I immediately thought why my parents didn’t sign me up for an all-girls school, how could they withhold the benefits from me? It turns out I just needed a fat lesson on smashing patriarchal and heteronormative myths and I’d be fine. Mile two feels like fire, gets me riled up a bit and the anger builds.
Mile 3
I don’t think I ever learned how to fail and be okay with it. It’s still something I work on everyday. Self love needs comes first. Mile three feels reflective.
Mile 4
How can I love myself when I don’t trust myself? Mile four feels raw.
Mile 5
Here’s where I convince myself that I am a mess. You are a loser and nobody loves you. Your best friend secretly talks shit about you, that’s why she hasn’t responded in three hours. You don’t work hard in school or outside, so you will never achieve what you want. You keep on making mistake after mistake, please try harder next time. Your body could be a lot better, why is it so heavy to run with? Why do your inner thighs hit one another when you step? Why can’t your lungs keep up? Aren’t these shorts a bit too tight? What’s going on with your acne? You definitely run ugly. Mile five feels like a stubbed toe against the wall of reality.
Mile 6
Italy, 2017, we went to a small beach that was supposed to be the clearest along the coast. Our tour guide told us it was a bit strange because it was a stone beach instead of sand. It was indeed beautiful, so breathtaking that when I fall asleep six years later to the mediation sound of waves crashing, this beach is painted across my eyes. Painted there is ten-year-old me, dashing in and out of the water relentlessly. My feet became cut, bruised and bleeding but I was proud of my battle scars. Mile six feels like rocks.
Mile 7
Seven has always been my favorite number. Christian theology says there are seven deadly sins: pride, envy, gluttony, greed, lust, sloth, and wrath. Seven was the age when I started sewing, my favorite thing to do in the whole wide world. In China, the stages of female life are denoted as multiples of seven, like age two times seven at puberty and seven times seven at menopause. My birth numbers are 02/05/07, the two plus five making the year ‘07. In Iran, a cat has seven lives.
I was seven when I learned that pulling your eyes back so they look like slits wasn’t such a funny joke. For as long as I can remember, I’ve spent my summers in L.A. swimming, sweating and eating sweets with my seven cousins. In ancient Egypt there were seven paths to heaven and seven halls of the underworld. Seven is the name of my favorite song by Jungkook, who is in a band of seven mates. Seven was the amount of mornings I couldn’t get out of bed because my heart felt too heavy. Mile seven feels like tip-toeing on a tightrope between love and hate or a line between sweets and sins.
Mile 8
So close yet so far. My mental strength comes out to play around this time. The ground is moving under me, and each step forward repeats again and again. I can control something when I know what’s coming next. I start converting my pain into fuel. Each movement is both powered by releasing tensions one step at a time. Mile eight feels the beginning of proud.
Mile 9
In my room, I had an empty wall. It was naked and I wanted to give it clothes. Since I could read, my Mom wrote notes to my brother and me for any occasion ever, or just for the hell of it. I dressed my wall in these notes, arranging and taping them spaced appropriately apart. I’ve hung over nine notes up there now. In different words on different papers they all say, “Hey baby! I’m here for you always”. Mile nine feels like it’s finally coming together, fully dressed for the occasion.
Mile 10
Mile ten feels hard.
Mile 11
I’m now in eleventh grade and I’ve signed up for my first marathon with my Dad. I can run over ten miles consistently. I started training seriously a year ago when I was tired of always being tired of my anxiety. There were a million problems going on, running through and around my brain.
Imagine a room full of little people talking, but you don’t know what they’re saying or how to help or make them listen or how to shut them up. I needed a way to turn it off, an escape. I found that when I’m sprinting the last mile, music on full blast, playing the song run BTS, all the little chatters float up and fade to dark. So everyday, I lace my shoes extra tight and call out to my mom, “Eomma, I’m headed to the gym.” I run and run and run and I can’t breathe and I’m flushed a hot burning red. But I am free. Mile eleven feels pretty nice, right?
Riley Young is a Filo-Chinese High School student based in San Francisco. Apart from creative writing, she likes to run long distance, work with kids, sew clothes and eat lots with her family. Mahal Kita!
SOURCES:
https://genius.com/Genius-english-translations-bts-run-bts-english-translation-lyrics https://www.britannica.com/topic/number-symbolism/7 https://www.dictionary.com/e/religion/the-seven-deadly-sins/
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/womens-issues/201909/what-is-the-one-overlooked-a dvantage-all-girls-schools#:~:text=Girls%20in%20same%2Dsex%20schools,a%20lot%20of%20 individual%20attention