The Most Important Hour of My Day - Rachael Berghahn

 

It's the beginning of June, the third full month of quarantine. I'm sitting at my desk in my English class, eating a protein bar, thinking about the virtual soccer classes I agreed to be signed up for, that my dad's friend had told us about, without knowing how important it would later become to me.

After my English class ends, I run downstairs, set up the cones that the people running the session had emailed out, and joined the zoom class. I don't really remember much from that first day, other than having to leave early to head off to math and being pretty bad at everything. These sessions are oriented towards being a futsal class, which is a sport slightly different from soccer, as it's played with five players on a court, meaning different skills are required. The sessions for the first two weeks of June all felt pretty similar, as I was still technically in school and usually had to leave early to get to another class. However, the last two weeks after school ended in June were what really got me hooked. 

I was finally able to stay for the full session, which allowed me to get the most out of it. I had honestly nothing going on during the last few weeks of June, which continued to be a pretty turbulent time in the world and having something to look forward to every day helped me so much mentally. This was something fun and engaging, that helped me grow as an athlete and kept me in shape, which was something really positive to have in my life during a tough time. 

During June, sessions would be one hour, 6 days a week. The two coaches leading it eventually had more events occurring, which led them in changing it down to 4 days a week in July and August. From October, to now January (September was a month off), classes have been 3 days a week. They consisted of a warm-up, a mixture of patterns, which consisted of moving through the cones performing certain skills, and reactions which involved reacting and performing a pattern as fast as possible, and a "finale" which would be the hardest activity of the day. The endless amounts of different activities that can occur during a session have been one reason that I and so many others have been kept engaged for so long, as the coaches are always switching it up and creating something new for us to do.

There are probably more ways than I can conceptualize why these hourly sessions are important to me. One of the easiest reasons is that it has been something always there for me during a hard time, that was not going to go away. It was an escape from a scary world when I needed one. Another simple reason why these sessions became important to me was that it was exercise, which is shown to provide strong mental benefits, which means exercise often makes me feel better about myself. Even on days without live sessions, I have access to a backlog of recorded ones, which provide me with a workout, keeping me active for more days in the week. Related to this, these classes were important to me as they helped me become a better soccer player, which is always something I want to improve. Most importantly, this was important to me as it was something I was doing for me, to improve. There was no comparing myself to others, which helped me just focus on a positive growth mindset and enjoying myself. I still find that I smile and laugh more during these sessions, even if I make a mistake, simply because I'm having fun.

Other activities could have probably taken this space in my life, but these futsal classes did, and have become so important to me. These classes speak to the value of many things, such as having an escape, exercise, improving skills, but most importantly, doing things you enjoy and have fun with.