Music saves lives, and I know that as a fact; it saved mine countless times. It’s my life support. If I don’t have it at least once a day, I get unpredictable. In a song by the famous and most controversial rapper Eminem, he quotes: “Music can alter moods and talk to you.” I feel strongly that this is true. As my life went all to chaos and changed before my eyes, music was always there to pull me through.

When I started 9th grade, I didn’t know what to expect. I was worried. I was scared. My worst fears all came true on the first day. I got lost, got late to class, I couldn’t even open my locker. When I came to physics late, the teacher got angry with me. Every excuse I made didn’t make sense to him. So started a turbulent relationship as his student, which would haunt me for the rest of the god-forsaken year I had there. My already low self-esteem became even lower, if that was even humanly possible. As a young teen, I was so frustrated with life; I still am and will be until my heart stops beating. I hated my appearance, was overly clumsy, wasn’t really good at anything in my eyes.

In the school I went to in 9th grade, you had to take a sport each season: fall, winter, and spring. I took Cross Country, thinking it would be easy. All you had to do was run, right? I couldn’t have been more wrong. It was a struggle. Everyone had done it before and had more endurance. I was fine at sprinting, but I just couldn’t keep it up. My self-esteem fell even more; I always came in last at each race (on my team). I wanted to quit at first, but the remains of the shattered pride I had left wouldn’t let me. I told myself I needed to finish what I started. I finished every race, despite asthma and extreme discomfort and pain. I have mixed feelings on reporting that there was one time when I came in second to last on my team, only because the poor girl who came in last was overworked, exhausted, and crying. I didn’t feel good about it, I felt sort of ashamed that I passed her, not knowing what she was going through. I think I remember asking if she was alright, and she nodded. What more could I have done?

Cross Country was in simplest terms utterly hell. I felt as if I was always out of shape and just couldn’t improve no matter how hard I worked and pushed. At the end, I had sore legs, could barely walk, and received a small trophy I still have, that I still don’t think I deserve to this day. The one thing I remember about it was that while painfully running down dark winding paths by myself in last place, members from the other team passing me, I would be thinking of the words and instrumentals of a song to get by during the race. It’s insane, but that’s what I did. When I got bored of one song, I went to the next, and so on, until I finally got to the cursed finish line that I worked so hard to get to. You feel like you’ve been running for days after you finish the 3.5 miles, sneaker to asphalt, wearing ridiculous maroon tank tops with shorts that were just too dang short. What a sight to see, some lanky Hispanic kid, wearing that stupid stuff. You’d think he’d be fast since he was so skinny, but no. He’s weak. People used to cheer me on, I didn’t really know if they were taunting. The rest of the year got better, but I still hated it at my high school. It’s a great school, but it just wasn’t for me.

All I remember about it now is a lot of breathless painful running, cold dark winter nights waiting alone for my mother or father to pick me up, my physics teacher yelling, and finally haunting memories of a girl I used to like. This chapter of my life sparked the brutal war I’m still fighting for life and ultimate happiness. I think of myself as a soldier, trudging along ever-shifting terrain and taking cover in trenches when all hell breaks loose, a rifle in my hands when I feel strong, and music in my soul when I am weak and bleeding. I’ll always believe that life can come in the form of music.