T'was the First Day of Practice

T'was the first day of practice and all through the dorms every creature was stirring, including the mouse. (I thought I'd try to recreate the famous Christmas poem, but I couldn't think of anything clever after that first line.)

Wednesday morning I could not stop freaking out about practice. "Will I be good enough, will I be able to get through conditioning, am I wearing the right uniform, will the other girls think I'm any good?" The list went on and on thanks to my roommates. Walking out to the field I was a nervous wreck. My hands were shaking, my heart was pounding extremely fast, and I was sweating uncontrollably.

It's like walking into lunch your first day of high school and worrying about if you have any friends to sit with. Ultimately, you'll either find someone to sit with or go out on a limb and make new friends.

All of my new teammates are incredibly nice and great leaders for all of us freshmen. They taught us how the warm up went, how coach likes things to be done, what kinds of drills we need to learn, and my favorite part, ladders.

It had poured down rain the night before so the grass was kind of wet. Nothing I couldn't handle, or so I thought...

Instead of cleating-up for these lovely ladder drills, coach has us keep our tennis shoes on. Any other day this would've been fine, but because of all the rain there was no way I could get traction in my crappy, old shoes.

I made it through the first round just fine. The second round through I completely ate it. My feet slipped right out from under me and I fell, HARD. After the initial shock and embarrassment, I busted out laughing! Right as I got up someone else fell only to lead to more laughter.

We all got through the mud pit and went on to play catch and loosen up our arms. As we jogged back into the dugout, one of the returners slipped immediately as she stepped into the dugout and fell straight on her butt. We all couldn't help but giggle as she just sat there laughing at herself.

This goes to show that even though nervousness and anxiety can overwhelm you, you aren't going to be the only one feeling that way! Thanks to my awesome teammates I know I'll be great friends with them!


P.S. Just kidding about the mouse from earlier, we don't actually have one in our room(;

Study Table Struggles

One of the tough things about being student-athletes is balancing study and workout time. One of the softball team expectations is that we log 8 or more hours of study time at the library. This may not seem very long, maybe an hour or so a night, but with practice every other day going to study wasn't one of my top priorities at first.

Monday I went to the library, a quiet, calm environment that turned out to be more like a zoo! Kids were running up and down the stairs and on the main floor, and shouting across the room all thanks to "The Great Library Race". This is an event created by librarians to get kids interested in the library and all of its tools for success. Safe to say I didn't get any studying done that day.

Working diligently for an hour or so doesn't seem that bad, right? Think again. By the time you get there, find a table, organize yourself and your homework, and get focused on what you need to do practically 30 minutes have gone by, for me at least.

One of my roommates and I decided to go later in the week to keep each other focused for the night. We each had a mental plan of what we needed to do and how we were going to get it done. Instead of actually following through with the plan, we sat there for the first hour talking about random things and laughing until our stomachs ached.

Library Rule #1: DON'T BRING FRIENDS TO THE LIBRARY

One of the things I couldn't stop laughing about was the fact that someone brought a Nintendo DS with them. YOU ARE A COLLEGE STUDENT, NOT A 12 YEAR OLD BOY! YOU SHOULD NOT BE PLAYING MARIO CART!

Photo Credit: Maddie Abbs

Library Rule #2: Don't be "that guy" playing with little kid toys...

Library Rule #3: Always dress warm in case you get cold easily like Savannah, and be sure to wear your backpack straps when your backpack gets too heavy!

Photo Credit: Maddie Abbs

Hopefully my laughter-filled library experiences will help you guys see what not to do!