Raymond's Run

Raymond’s run is a short story written by Toni Cade Bambara and it all started on a nice sunny morning where a girl called squeaky and her big troubled brother named Raymond went out for a walk. This morning Squeaky is practicing her breathing exercises breathing in and out on counts of seven. While she is doing this her brother Raymond is pretending to drive a stage coach driver. When all of a sudden these mean girls came walking by to mess with squeaky and Raymond while they were walking down Broadway. After the girls called them names and tried to intimidate them which didn’t work. It actually made squeaky more determined to beat them in the track meet that’s coming up soon. She knew that she was going to win because she faster and better than the other girls and no matter what they said they wouldn’t change her mind.

In the story like I said before the author Toni Cade Bambara is trying to tell you that you can win or do whatever it is that you want to achieve if you put your mind to it. For example let’s say that you’re a poor free throw shooter. One thing you could do is set goal. If you have trouble with free throws your goal would to make a certain amount of free throws in a game. Now that you have a goal set you have to work to achieve that goal. One way you could achieve this goal is to practice by shooting at least a hundred free throws a day and keep track of how many you make out of a that hundred or more free throws. He is also telling the readers that you shouldn’t let people tell you that you’re not good enough because you are you just have to keep working to get better. This is one thing that the great Michael Jordan knows and tries to tell others that. Just because you don’t make a select team that you tried out for it doesn’t mean that you’re not good. It just means that you have to work that much harder.

That’s what Michael Jordon told himself when he got cut from his high school basketball team. He also told himself that when he first came into the NBA and people told him that he was a bad shooter and defender. When he was told that he responded by saying, “Now that I know my weaknesses I am going to take them and work on them until they become my strengths.” And he did that until he was known as one of the league’s greatest shooters and defenders. Squeaky is very similar because she too practices her running and although she is told that she isn’t going to win the next track meet she doesn’t listen to them she just ignores them and just keeps practicing.

And just like Michael Jordon after he completes his many goals he gives back to the community by running basketball camps. Squeaky’s way of giving back was she was going to help Raymond take up the sport of running she was going to help him on his running form and his breathing. And that is why you shouldn’t listen to people that telling you that you aren’t good enough.