The Stick Place!

Cross county practice is always the best part of any day, especially when we have a long run. My pack of girls cycles through about a dozen routes so that we don’t get bored of the same places. One of my favorite running destinations is the Stick Place, which lies behind the Arboretum. The Stick Place is a small forest of tall, thin trees planted in straight rows, interspersed with twiggy bushes and the ruins of past cross country building projects. Thick woody vines hang between some trees, providing excellent ropes for swinging. Light filters peacefully through the tall branches, contributing to the serene atmosphere. Sometimes we’ll spot a deer picking its way through the undergrowth or hear birds calling to each other from above.

The Stick Place is a wonderful destination if you’re looking for some peace and quiet, but the girls cross country team runs there to smash sticks. We whack fallen branches on trees to shatter them with a satisfying thwack! Stick shards fly as we release negative energy, stress, and pent-up anger. Visiting the Stick Place improves the emotional wellbeing of our team, especially during the most stressful times. I desperately needed a visit to the Stick Place last week – I was drowning in assignments, panicking about college, and scrambling to prepare for the Climate Strike in a short amount of time. Luckily, Wednesday was designated as a long run day, so the girls headed out to smash our worries at the Stick Place.

My running pack left Kenney ranting about everything. It had been a week, and yet there was so much more to be finished by Friday. The sophomores had another history tiz to cram for, the juniors didn’t understand physics, and the seniors were filled with crushing dread about the ever-nearing November 1 deadline. We complained bitterly as we traversed campus and entered the quiet Arboretum. By the time we arrived at the Stick Place, I was ready to violently smash a large number of sticks. I picked up my first stick, gripped it firmly against my body, and whirled around to watch it collide against a wide trunk and splinter into three rough chunks. Take that, College Board! The Stick Place was soon filled with the furious sounds of crashing wood and hollers from my teammates. The thwacks dissolved into laugher as we surveyed the damage, enjoying a new sense of calm contentment.

Ducking under the last low-hanging branches, we emerged from the Stick Place near a wide soy field extending in rays of green. Looking up at the vast Illinois sky, awash with pure blue and touched with cloud puffs, I was filled with a feeling of contentment stronger than any stress I’d been struggling with just hours earlier. I felt refreshed, full of new energy and excitement. The world seemed more beautiful than before. My pack began running down the familiar gravel path, each step crunching satisfyingly as we passed short greenhouses and wheat crops behind the Arboretum. We had run so many miles on these paths together, and we could handle any stress with the power of Sticks.