< Back | Home

Cross country runner, Jen Gomez hits the ground running on the indoor track during a practice warm-up at Las Positas College. Gomez continues to push herself toward her future, both athletically and in school.

Hawk brings energy to cross country

By: Ben Kolina

Posted: 10/10/08

As this last fall semester began at Las Positas, cross country coach Steve Navarro was teaching a rock climbing class at Livermore's Valley Rock Gym when he noticed a student who was wearing an old pair of running shoes, and attacking the wall with a relentless spirit.
"Jen (Gomez) doesn't give up," Navarro said. "She demonstrated strength and endurance."
Although Jen Gomez had almost no team sports experience before joining the Las Positas cross country team, coach Navarro saw the makings of a distance runner in the athleticism and perseverance she demonstrated as a student in that rock climbing class.
Gomez was reluctant at first.
"I was skeptical," Gomez said. "I had no real experience."
However, she put those skepticisms aside and joined the LPC cross country team, which keeps the motto, "Most people need wheels and a tank of gas to get this far."
In Gomez's own life, 'wheels and a tank of gas' would not be quite enough to get her to the places she has been in the past year. In June of this past year, Gomez returned from 15 months serving as an army medic in Baquba, Iraq. After returning, she enrolled in classes at LPC just 2 months later.
It's easy to see why coach Navarro considers Gomez a leader. In a sport that is all about pushing your physical limits, she is a steady source of encouragement for her teammates, setting a positive tone for the team. Gomez hesitates to call herself a leader, but she is very mindful of the lessons that she learned about leadership during her time in the Army.
If there is one time when her enthusiastic demeanor becomes quiet and reflective, it would be when mentioning the places she has been to before starting her career at LPC.
Going from a war zone to a community collage atmosphere in one summer is hardly an easy task.
"It takes time," Gomez said. "And I'm at the very beginning of that." Along with the normal difficulties any student experiences in returning to school after a few years away, there are the additional hurdles related to the fact that she spent her time away from school in circumstances most LPC students may not be able to understand.
"Someone actually asked me 'was it fun?' I was stunned, Gomez said. "How do you answer that? Of course it wasn't fun. I wasn't on vacation."
For Gomez, the cross country team has given her valuable common ground with her fellow students and teammates. The team has been a sanctuary from the insensitivity she has encountered at times since she has returned to the U.S.
Sometimes, a thing as simple as working together with teammates to push yourself and each other to achieve the best that each individual is capable of can provide the necessary tools to bridge gaps of experience, communication, or any other differences people may have.
Gomez said the team has given her "a way to communicate with people from the school. It's a different world. The way we think and the way we act are totally different". The LPC cross country team has helped her to bridge some of the gaps that she has encountered in the next phase in her life as a student.
She has given the team her determination, attitude and energy.
Gomez works hard on and off the track, hoping to eventually peruse civilian medicine as a career. She would like to go into the field of kinesiology.
As she continues the day-to-day process of putting her experiences involving war into the context of her life, she doesn't shy away from questions about her experiences. However, she does cringe at the insensitive questions and comments.
Gomez's advice to anyone who may want to talk to a returning soldier about his or her experiences in Iraq is to ask "questions that can be answered in one word, things like: Where were you? What was your job?" Answers to the more complex questions bring out memories about the war in Iraq, are often not easy questions for the people who experienced it and they generally don't provide quick answers.
Readjusting to civilian life after 15 months in a war zone is not a simple task for anyone.
Adapting to life back in the U.S. is on a day to day basis. Much like the task of a distance runner, it is a big journey that can only be taken one step at a time.
With the same tenacity and determination that Gomez first showed coach Navarro on the climbing wall, she continues to push herself, athletically and academically, towards her future, while at the same time, never forgetting her past.