Journal 3 Alexandra Edwards

The reading is going great the book is really interesting. Since the stories are only a few pages it is really easy to stay focused and not get board with the reading since every story is different.  The strengths of the book are the short stories, they get right to the point. Each story is different but they all relate to the title, Dreamers, Visionaries, Eccentrics, and Other American Heroes. The weaknesses of the book would be the stories don’t go into as much detail as I would like. Also the stories are older so I wish the book would include what has happened to these people since the interviews. My strategy for active reading is to look up things mentioned in the stories, like the Grotto of Redemption in Father Louis H. Greving’s story you don’t really get the full effect of the work that had to be put into the Grotto until you see pictures of it.

            A theme that has been present in my own life is the response to risk and the results. I swam for nine years, four of which was on my high school swim team. I never really participated in other sports, swimming was my life. In June of 2010 at a youth camp with my church a group of my friends and I were playing two-hand tap football. Close to the end of the game I caught the football and went to run into the end zone when someone pushed me and my right leg stayed in place and the rest of my body shifted, all I heard was a pop and felt a lot of pain. At the time I thought I had just twisted my knee and it would be fine in a few days. However, my mom being a nurse had me to go to the doctor just to make sure. My doctor sent me for an MRI, and from that we found out I had torn my right ACL. We went to a special surgeon in Columbus to talk about my options. He told us that the recovery and rehab time was about six months. If I had the surgery as soon as possible I could be ready to compete for our first competition on my sophomore year in December. So two weeks later in the second week of July I was back in Columbus getting prepped for my surgery. This was my first surgery and so many things were running though my mind. After the surgery I remember waking up and feeling the pain in my knee. I had to keep my knee wrapped up for a week until my stitches came out so to stabilize my knee they had me in a brace that went from my ankle to my hip. I had to use crutches for the first few weeks, and after my stitches were out I started physical therapy. Once you have your leg straight for a week it’s very hard and painful to get it to bend again. Thankfully after a few weeks of physical therapy I was able to get in the therapy pool, which is where I’m conformable. I knew I had to push myself to get better so I could swim. Though the six months of physical therapy there was a lot of pain, sweat, and tears. Since I was in physical therapy for so long all the staff knew me so I got to start training by myself while my therapist finished up with other patients. The whole experience made me a stronger swimmer and a stronger person.  If I wouldn’t have taken the risk to have the surgery I could have injured myself even more and made it to where I wouldn’t be able to swim the rest of the season. Instead I took the risk to have the surgery and to go though therapy and it ended up being a great decision, I was stronger and at the end of the season I went my best time in the 100 backstroke, which got my the school record.