One More Mile, 2003, by Kelsey Kranz

From MemoryArchive

Who: Kelsey Kranz
What: One More Mile
When: November, 2003
Where: Washington, Iowa

One More Mile

I looked outside the door and heard my mom come up the stairs.

She said, “Where are you going? Do you have somewhere you need to go?”

“No, mom,” I replied. “I’m just going on a quick run, I’ll be back in a little bit.”

I stepped outside onto my back porch with my orange shorts and an old cross-country tee shirt. I slowly reached for my toes, and felt my muscles tighten. After a minute of stretching, I took off down the driveway feeling the wind blow against me. I ran to the end of the street and wondered if I could make it all the way to the bridge today. As I was running along the street, it felt as if the cars were rushing by, like I wasn’t even moving! I picked up my pace as I headed down a new street.

After reaching the Kewash trail, the whole environment changed. It was like the whole world was shut out and it was just me on the trail. I wasn’t sure how far I was going to run, I just kept going. When I reached the highway, again I reached down for my toes, but this time my muscles weren’t tight. I knew that I could go further than usual today. I started running again and I heard the peaceful sound of birds chirping. I also heard my feet pounding the ground as if they were my heart beating. I went around a turn and came into the sunshine. It was like the clouds parted for me and I felt free. As I reached the bridge I had always ran to, all I could think about was going just one more mile. One more mile would take me farther than I’d gone before. I kept running to see if I could make it just that one more mile.