The fact that there was some trace of moisture at the corners of her eyes was of little concern to the young girl sitting quietly on the closely trimmed turf. She was more worried about the annoying blister that was rising fast on the edge of her throwing hand. Her threatening tears were merely the result of frustration over failing to beat the big chunky Chinese girl with the goggle-like glasses on her over-sized head.

It was strange for her to have advanced this far in the competition because she was the smallest and the lightest of the contestants in the Discus Throwing event. Her shoulder muscles were sore from the elimination cycles and now she had a stupid blister to remind her of her unsatisfactory small stature for such an event. Still, she was determined to do her very best just to show what she could achieve when she put her mind to it.

The heavy metal discs were sitting placidly between her legs. She lifted one of them just to stay familiar with the balance of the perfect symmetry of the circle. This was her favorite competition discus. She seldom used it in practice to protect it from some unfortunate damage.

When she spun on her toes and loosed the disc she always felt that little jolt of excitement that signaled a good throw. It seemed improbable that she was able to achieve the distance she usually averaged in the competitions because of her petite frame. She watched her friend make her last throw failing to beat the top three girls from their opposing team. Soon it would be her turn again. She would have one last chance to edge out one of those girls for the event ribbon on this beautiful sunny Saturday morning.

The same sun was starting to beat down heavily on the meet contestants and the judges and the workers keeping the field all shipshape for the events. She was starting to sweat a bit but she knew that was a good thing. It was when she was not sweating that something was not quite right with her body temperature. Her hair was pulled back into a pony tail to keep it out of her eyes and a little puddle formed under her tailbone to remind her of her need to keep drinking liquids.

She looked up into the stands and saw her sister talking with some silly boy who sat listening to her words with an interested look on his face. Her mom was exchanging recipes with some lady she didn’t know who had a sleeping toddler in a stroller at her feet. Her father was on the phone again probably talking to someone at work about some stupid issue with their computer. Her brother was nowhere to be seen. He was probably getting into trouble because it had a way of finding him without any serious effort on his part.

She remembered that there was a neighborhood party later today and wondered if she would have to have “babysitting” duties with any of the smaller children. Sometimes it was better to be free to sit and listen to the adults and play other games instead of watching the small ones.

The sound of her stomach rumbling reminded her that all she had eaten today was the left-over donut from the day before. She knew that if she didn’t eat it, the forlorn survivor would probably be thrown out as being too stale for consumption. In reality, she was doing both the donut and planet a good deed by making it useful and insuring that food was not wasted.

It was a good thing that her uniform was so loose fitting because the sweat had made it damp and it started to cling to her body. The non-revealing nature of the cut was to eliminate loss of concentration for both the competitors and the onlookers.