Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end...

Standing on the sidelines of a field hockey match up between my summer field hockey coach's college team, and my high school team-mate's team, I watched and realized how bitter-sweet any end to this match would actually be. For one of my friends, the season would be over with a loss; but, in addition, for one of my friends, her career would be over with a loss. Neither one was ready to lose. The game took double over time to cater a winner...and that winner was the one who would be fortunate enough to have her team next year--to have her sport--My summer field hockey coach.

My friend, and my high school teammate, who played her heart out, along with the rest of her teammates, knew exactly what this loss meant: it meant the end to something that started as just a fun after-school activity, something that grew into the daily routine of life--something that became part of her...something that truly owned a huge chunk of her heart.

I watched as girls walked off the field, with pride in their hearts but tears in their eyes. I watched as parents hugged their girls who were baffled at how field hockey could be such a huge part of their life one moment--and gone in an instant the next. And I watched as hearts broke over something that had become closer to them than anything else over the last 10 years of their lives. And I was suddenly reminded of all those feelings--all over again.

And I was reminded, again today, when I read that the University of Maryland may be cutting their swimming teams after this season. After the field hockey team was eliminated at URI, my mother and I wrote a joint article for Inside Higher Ed. entitled: Foul Play which uncovered the emotion behind losing your sport-ending your sport-giving your life to sport.

As athletes, we spend our entire careers devoting time, energy, and body parts to a sport that welcomes us with open arms--to a life that promises us pay-off with the pay-in. We work hard so that we can attend Division 1 colleges--though no one tells us how difficult it will be once we get there. We give up going out on Friday nights for a curfew that is bestowed upon us so that we perform better the next morning. We form bonds with teammates and coaches. We lose ourselves and find ourselves. We discover our strengths--and our weaknesses. We learn what it means to lose--and what it means to win. We gain pride--and passion. And we fall in love--with sport. So when we lose that--it only makes sense that our hearts break--that the pieces are left on every field or in every pool or on every course that we ever played on, swam in, or ran on. That we feel like an out of tune piano--or an unsharpened knife in the drawer. When our team is taken away from us--or when our careers end due to it being time for it to end--it is unexplainable the emotions that go through us. There will always be some void...but we have to remember that there will always be the memories to fill that void:

As my mother wrote in that article: "To use words like death and grief--is not to exaggerate."

When I lost field hockey at a sophomore in college, I compared it to losing a friend--to losing a relative--to losing someone that I loved. It still feels that way. But like losing friends--and losing family members and losing people we love...we learn to find ways to look back on these things--these events in our lives, these huge parts of our lives and smile at what we were lucky enough to have. And suddenly the void of that person or thing is filled with smiles of memories...moments in our lives that we know we can't ever return to, but that we were fortunate enough to have.

Disclaimer: In regards to the cuts at UMD--I do not support UMD's decision and intend to write a letter to the university. I understand that universities are undergoing hard times right now--just as are all businesses, but cutting academics and sports are entirely too heartbreaking for students and athletes that we tell to dream big their whole lives.

Occupation: Superhero

At my pre school graduation every single one of us was asked to tell the audience composed of parents, brothers, sisters, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and family friends what we planned to be when we grew up. The answers ranged from firefighters to doctors to lawyers to dentists. Why our pre-k teachers were asking us what we wanted to be when we were barely old enough to pronounce three syllable words really is beyond me, but nonetheless, I responded by saying I wanted to be the first female president. If I had known what that meant, when I was just a four year old, I probably would have said “Anything but the president.”

And if it were four years ago, I may have said “I want to be a sports broadcaster,” but now I know exactly what I want to be, and that is a superhero. I want to be able to save the world one great cause at a time. I want to impact someone who then in turn impacts someone else, which thus results in a continuous line of impact.

I want to provide the world with a kaleidoscope of viewpoints. I want to make a change.

I think part of me first realized this when a teacher once told me that I was going to change the world. This was soon after learning that my college field hockey program had been cut from the University of Rhode Island. At that point in my life, I had completely believed that sports were the only thing that mattered and that if sports didn’t exist then well, nothing else did either.

The other part of me realized how much I wanted to make a difference in the world when I was exchanging emails with a newly acquainted pen pal on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. Instead of defining myself to him as an athlete or field hockey player, I told him that I was a writer and a traveler and that I had hoped to learn of new things of the places I was traveling, with his help, since he had traveled before as well. I wanted to learn more about the world so I could impact the world as it was impacting me.

In the last nine months, I have lived in New York City, wishing that I could help every homeless person to a piece of bread, and every child without an education to a simple math problem. I have lent my hand to people by opening the door for them even when they walked away without saying thank you, and I have given up my seat to strangers following a long day at work. I have made an effort to save the world one small task at a time, and at the end of the day I have felt both wonderful and inspired because of it. Since coming to New York, I have been changed. I may not have a full-time career just yet, but I know that putting the word superhero next to occupation is beginning to look more and more like the full-time job that I would like to take on.

And to be honest, while sports scores interest me on a “brain candy” level (as my tenth grade English teacher might refer to it)…saving the world just seems much more appealing.