Cross Country

Waking up at 5:30 Saturday morning to help drive our Cross Country team to their meet reminded me of what my high school experience was like - and how different it stands from our students'.

We arrive at Laguna Hills High to a traffic jam of buses and shiny, fancy cars. "Miss, everyone here is really white and really skinny," Victor says as my lovely '95 Camry, unwashed since before summer break, rolls up to an orange vest.


He initially directs me to the left, then looks in my car and asks, "Wait, you're not running are you?" When I tell him that yes, the four kids dressed in black and flannel are indeed runners, he has me swing to the right.


I successfully parallel park between a dumpster and the type of monstrous truck that never ceases to bewilder and annoy me while filling up California roads and compact parking spaces, and we head to a practice football field to find our team. Swarms of skinny white kids in matching warm-ups and moms with snacks greet us at the entrance. Their impressive numbers and professional tents briefly prevent us from finding our 14-member team and their belongings spread on a single tarp.

It seems our team found the other culturally diverse one in attendance and set camp alongside them. Long Beach High was reassuringly brown, albeit somewhat rude and unsharing of their bagels and orange slices.

Sully passed his team their uniforms fresh from the bag. The kids, without matching sweats to stay covered, rushed to find places to quickly get the uniforms on underneath their denim before anyone saw - none happy about the length of the short, a complaint Sully silenced with, "Find a different sport."


The kids know they have a good thing going here. Even without buses, moms and fancy tents, they have a strong team and a qualified coach who worked with them all summer, resulting in multiple personal bests this weekend. Even the two slowest on the team, who found themselves lapped by two different races, are equals in the eyes of their peers.


As we pull out of the lot and head to In-N-Out, Victor daydreams outloud, "I would like to go here. It's nice and you could get really good training." And as I look back on the gateless school, able to host large competitions that expose their students to all parts of L.A. - where a kid with Victor's natural ability will at least be a contestent for a medal, I think to myself how my goal is for him to go to a place like that too.

We'll see.