My dream day at Churchill Downs ended, and the search for the perfect college began. As we headed down the interstate through Louisville, on our way out of town, we passed the University of Louisville. I looked down to see trash blowing across an inner-city baseball field. My parents inquired one last time, “Are you sure you don’t want to visit U of L?” It seemed like an inner city school, not up to my academic standards. Nevermind it was 3 miles from Churchill Downs. I imagined attending school in the middle of Thoroughbred farm country.
In less than an hour and a half we arrived at the University of Kentucky. Nestled in a small downtown area surrounded by farms, training tracks, and just a few miles from Keeneland it was everything I imagined. As we walked through the park near campus I imagined dangling my feet in the fountains that lined the park. I could even envision a Kentucky boy stealing my heart and proposing to me there. We toured the campus and discussed how I would get to the track when freshman weren’t allowed cars. I could see myself here. When we met with an admissions counselor I smiled with pride as she read off my resume. I had worked for years to build something that any college would drool over. We discussed scholarships, and the counselor took a quick glance at my ACT score. With a smile on her face she said, “I see you have a 30 on your ACT. With a 31 you would be eligible for a full out-of-state scholarship!”
My breath got short. The world began to spin. 31?…31??????!!!!!!!!!!!!! My heart dropped to my stomach and the blood rushed to my face. For 2 years I had practiced that damn test and taken it at least 6 times. I had pulled my score up from a 26 to a 30. Hardly anyone I knew had made a 30 or higher, and I had KNOWN that when I had a 30 on my ACT NOONE short of Ivy League schools would turn me down. I knew that with a 30 I was guaranteed a full scholarship at any state school and a darn good scholarship at nearly any other school. And here this lady flippantly made the statement as if a 31 was easy to come by…as if raising your score one more point was a simple feat…as if everyone is doing it.
You see, in my family it is expected that we follow the money trail. We didn’t have the money to pay out-of-state tuition for four years. Plus, I was nearly guaranteed a top scholarship at my parents Alma Mater – a fantastic school that just happened to be planted about 400 miles from any race track. I knew that if I wanted to follow my dream, it had to cost my family less than whatever Mississippi College would cost.
There were more schools to look at, so we hopped in the car. A trip to the Kentucky Horse Park re-energized me, and I was ready to see more of the Bluegrass State and find my perfect college (assuming I couldn’t make a 31 on the ACT). We drove a huge loop east of Lexington and then back west to Louisville, stopping at 2 or 3 more schools. One college in particular begged me to consider. They ate up my resume as I had imagined everyone else would. However, what I had found was the Kentucky Bluegrass didn’t exactly cover the entire state. Once we left the area around Lexington and Louisville, those beautiful legendary farms that stretched for miles and miles became more and more sparse until there were none. Cumberland admissions continued to attempt in their persuasion by saying, “there’s a cow farm up the road, and I’m sure we could talk to the owner and he’d let you keep your horse there.” My eyes glazed over. My dream of galloping racehorses seemed to be slipping through my fingers.
Before we left that great state of of Kentucky we made a final stop at the Churchill Downs gift shop to purchase a painting. As my dad paid and my mom continued to browse, I stepped outside and gazed into the sky. With ever fiber of my being I knew this was where God was calling me. My heavy heart was lifted in a way impossible to describe. I longed for my feet to be planted to the Churchill Downs concrete, so that nothing could take me away. Everything seemed to be against me, pulling my dream from my tightly grasped knuckles. Yet as I stared into Heaven I felt God say, “Don’t give up. This is in your future.”
I was quiet on the trip home. It had been an exciting adventure, but now I had to figure out how to turn this dream into a reality.
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