I am a senior on the lacrosse team at Saint Mary’s. Like many others, I have felt these past four years slip away all too quickly. I feel so accomplished to have put forth so much time and effort to a team that has become like my family. The lacrosse team has made me grow, has shaped me into the person I am today and has shaped my identity. I will carry the lessons I’ve learned for the rest of my life and will keep the friends I’ve made close to my heart forever. While this team has become some of my closest friends, it has been lonely at the same time.
As I said before, I am a senior on the lacrosse team, but what I failed to mention is that I am the only senior. Since my sophomore year, I have been a class of one. At first the team and I thought of it as a joke. On team media days when we would take group pictures by class I would raise my hand really high and shout “Sophomores over here!” Everyone would laugh because I was the only one. This went on for my junior year season and will probably happen again during my senior year.
Now, in my senior season there are stories and experiences that my coaches and I share, but stories that not one of my other teammates know about. I will go up to other teammates and say “Remember when this happened or that happened,” and they will look at me like I’m crazy. I have to remember that I was the only one there that knows the story and the feelings that came with it. I have no other teammate my age that knows what it has been like to be in my class for these past four years.
Even though lacrosse is a spring sport and we haven’t started our traditional season yet, I feel mixed emotions about Senior Day that is to come. It will be fantastic and a day to remember. The team has renamed “Senior Day” to “Kendra Day” because it will be a day devoted to the single member of the senior class — me. While it will be a fun-filled day just for me, I will be sad to not be able to share the day with other people. I will have no other classmates to walk the field with me, no other people to be announced, and no other people to take a class picture with.
If you have been on a sports team, you know that you lean on your teammates and that they lean on you in return. While I have many people who support me and want me to do well, it is sad to not have a class to share these memories with. However, I wouldn’t change my experience with the lacrosse team in any way, shape or form. This has been some of the greatest four years of my life and while I would want to share this time with additional teammates in the class of 2020, it would have drastically changed the dynamic of the last four years.
I want to thank the Saint Mary’s athletic department, my coaches and my teammates, both past and present. I hope that my teammates read this and take the time they have left to cherish the moments with their teammates, both in their class and outside. I hope they use great poses for their class pictures, and I hope they walk together hand-in-hand on their senior night, finishing their last home game together. Thank you Saint Mary’s lacrosse and Go Belles!
