It was the last pole-vault practice before the state of my sixth grade year. The hot musty, dusty shed was buzzing with activity. There was the constant crunch of poles sliding into the box. Kids and parents were chatting excitedly about the coming days activities. The hot pink vet wrap on my pole was unbelievably sticky, this was because of the weather. I climbed across the cement floor on my heels, because I didn’t want my spikes getting dull. I eventually came across the old wooden fold-up table.

“Can you re-wrap my pole for me please?” I asked my coach.

“Just do it yourself, you're old enough.”He told me.

I hesentally took the sharp knife from his outstretched hand. Then I sat down on the scratchy terf and started to cut the tape off, because the tape was old and sticky, it took some force to cut it. Near the top end of the pole the knife got stuck. I tugged on it lightly, but not to hard in fear of hurting my self. Nothing happened. I pulled even harder. The knife slipped and white-hot pain shot up my arm.I looked down to see blood gurgling up from under my skin. I blood kept coming. There was a chunk of skin missing from right above my left wrist. I jogged over to the wooden counter for a band-aid. The blood seeped into the band-aid in about two minutes. I went through a box of band-aids in about two days that week.

I told my coach what had happened, he smiled and said, “Guess I’m not giving you a knife anymore.”

I laughed half-heartedly, and turned to walk out of the large garage door that kept us inside that musty, dusty, old shed.