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Brooke Sommers

Rickard

English 1101

12 September 2018

A rewarding day

Have you ever had that one moment in your life where you feel like you are doing

something that will make a difference to someone else? Volunteering your time to help others is

a great way to make you feel like you are doing something great in the world. My softball team

and I went to the Special Olympics and helped out there. It was so rewarding in lots of different

ways.

One summer afternoon, my travel softball team and I went to volunteer at the Special

Olympics. They had the Special Olympics in Hilliard,Ohio at Municipal fields. Municipal fields

is a huge softball and baseball complex with eight fields total. It was a huge complex with lots of

green grass in the outfield. I texted the softball team about where to meet and what time we were

leaving. The softball team met at my house and we all piled into the three cars. When we arrived

at the fields there were loads of people and it seemed like they just kept flooding in to go up to

the sign in table. We all stood in line for what seemed like forever. When we finally got all

checked in and the paperwork filled out, the people working it assigned us all into different

stations they had set up on each of the fields.

At the first field, were me and my teammates, Molly and Harlie had to wait for the

participants to walk up and then explain to them what they had to do at the throwing station. Me,

Molly and Harlie, and the other people in our group started cheering, clapping and jumping up

and down when the participants showed up on the field. We all circled around the guy who was
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in charge of the field we were at. He said, “At this field we will be throwing the softball as far as

we can. You guys will throw the ball and once it hits the ground the volunteers here will take out

the tape measure and record how far the ball went.” The first participant was up and he threw the

ball as far as he could. Thud, you could hear the ball hitting the ground and then the sound of

crunching dirt beneath it. Me, Molly and Harlie ran on to the dirt and pulled out the measuring

tape and wrote down how far the ball was thrown. After all of the participants went and recorded

the results, we switched to a different field.

The second field that we went to was base running. The bases were all set up and we had

to time how fast the participants ran from home to first and all the way around the bases. We

waited until the new group of people arrived at the base running station. The first person that was

up was named Abby, she was super excited and when we told her to get ready she darted to

home plate. On your mark, get ready, set, go! Abby darted around the bases, hair flying

everywhere, arms pumping and legs going back and forth. Before we knew it she was already

back at home plate. She was so excited that she had ran so fast. Everyone was feeding off of

everyone else's excitement , jumping up and down and screaming. After everyone ran around the

bases, we all got water and handed it out to the participants. The day was soon coming to an end,

everyone was tired, but we were on our last station.

The last and final station was the soft toss station. As me, Molly and Harlie walked over

to the last station, we noticed that everyone was super exhausted and had sweat dripping off of

their faces and the dust from the field faintly on their arms and legs. The sun was slowly going

down, turning the sky purple and pink. We arrived at the field which was flooded with people

catching the balls people had hit. The guy soft tossing had sweat dripping everywhere and it was

puddled all over his shirt. The first person was up to bat and his name was Eric. He was so full of
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energy and always had a big smile on his face. He stepped in the white lined batters box and

swung at the first pitch. Smack! It was a success! The ball skidded across the dirt and into the

outfield, where it skipped into my friend Sabrina’s glove. Everyone got to hit at least five balls or

until they hit one. After everyone hit, we recorded the data and returned it to the sign in table

and waited for the results. Everyone gathered around the sign in table and it felt like we were

packed in like sardines, we were so close. The results were in and they told us who was in the top

five and they each got in a line. The people running the Special Olympics were handing out the

medals and putting it over the participants neck. The participants parents were so happy. They

got out their phones and started snapping pictures of them with their medals and taking pictures

with us. All you could hear was the snapping of the phones and the laughs they were sharing

with their family. Everyone there all got in a big blob and someone stood on a table while they

took the picture of us. It was a great experience volunteering at the Special Olympics. It made

me realize that no matter what is going on or has happened in your life you have to keep a smile

on your face and just be happy.

In conclusion this was an awesome experience that I will never forget. The people

participating taught me so many lessons and I will never forget those. It was so fun seeing them

have a good time and enjoying themselves with their family and friends. My softball team had so

much fun, that we would try and volunteer the following year.