i don't know.
i guess you could say shooting has always just been this part of me that comes and goes.
like now.
like when it comes, it fills up everything and that period in your life,
it's the only thing that matters as much.
and. yeah. so i say it's my cca, and i train a bunch of times every week,
but it's just different from everything else because one lousy score can
you know,
tear me apart or something.
which is odd, i don't feel that way for tests, which comparatively, should be more important to a student.
so the conclusion is that when i'm shooting, nothing else really matters.
but it lets me down every single time.
i don't know, since the start, we have been fighting for this,
or fighting for that,
and we heard stories about seniors getting kicked out days before nationals,
and we cringe about it,
but when it happens to you, it just feels surreal. i don't know.
i guess your body allows you to react accordingly.
smile, nod, say that you understand, continue training like nothing ever changed.
next day, you won't need to turn up for training anymore.
two weeks later, they compete without you.
even though you were there from the start and all that time spent,
suddenly nobody bothers because hey,
there you are and you've just been tossed aside.
to be fair, it had to be done. seemed like the reasonable option, of course.
but sometimes you just wonder if it's really just about the medals.
that was last year.
i don't know, it's not something you get over easily,
which seems really stupid and calculative, but you don't just walk away from something like this.
then when it starts all over again, but in a different sense.
seems to me there isn't a year where everyone leaves happy that they
were given the recgonition that they thought they earned.
they tell you that the firing line is your stage.
they hand you a gun.
they ask you to please, just have fun,
because the score is just a number, you know?
i know.
it's a bloody number that means everything, okay?
you will tell us what we want to hear of course, but when we don't shoot like we should,
suddenly we don't matter.
you can sort of sense it when you know you are being judged by your previous mistakes.
it's an unforgivable sort of sport.
and at the end of the day, everyone bloody reduces it to three digits that apparently matters so damn much.
why?
so what now? we train, and we get in, and we get the damn medals for them, and we're out?
because i used to remember a time when we were really in it for love,
which drives you to do crazy shit like reaching home at midnight and starting on your homework, and feeling like you're going to fail all your tests, but knowing that you had a fulfilling training that day and it makes it all better.
but now.
i suppose it's only fair, though. what with nationals around the corner,
what, two weeks? and there's always the select few who has to bring in the medals,
the supporting ones just there to fill up the team,
and of course the remaining ones who will hover quietly in the back when the team receives the medals.
people gather for a photo, they grimace and try to hide.
i love shooting, you know?
and i keep thinking that it was one of the best decisions i ever made
ever since that day i hesitated and stared at the teacher and somehow said okay i'm in.
and suddenly i was part of something much bigger.
something which actually means the world to me now, more or less.
but then there come a time when everyone is expecting so much.
we wear our suits, and bear the weight of the gun
but you know you also carry the weight of all the shitloads of expectations
and you go up there alone.
and you shoot.
one shot, two shot, through to forty.
you make it or you break it, and it changes that piece of your life.
it's not their fault, of course.
i mean, the school provides and funds, we bring in the prizes,
sounds like a fair deal, i guess.
but you know, somewhere in between the line of attaining glory, it becomes
a rivalry between friends, it becomes your heart slamming into your ribcage every time you wait for an email to load, because it just means that much. that you wouldn't cry for anything in the world,
but you would, for shooting.
it's weird, i don't quite get it myself.
all i know is, there are days, where everyone is staring at you, you are wedged up in the lanes between other shooters, people are everywhere,
but you pick up your gun and you feel more alone than ever.
all i know, though, is i won't ever walk away from it, as much as it kills me sometimes,
because i cannot.
because i have to shoot, even if everything about why we are doing it is screwed up.
i don't know. maybe it's
for that fragment of a minute when i'm raising my gun,
everything seems normal for once.
like how it should be.
but
like how it indefinitely isn't.
):
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