In middle school, I always watched the color guard when going to high school games. I was fascinated by the uniforms, the silks, but more importantly the relationship these girls had. Watching them walk onto the field together, holding hands, praying over each other, and smiling together made me want to join. I knew color guard was a sport like no other, not only was it a team, it was a sisterhood.

Tryouts came and I had my best friend by my side to take on this new journey with, but little did I know the friendships that would develop with every single girl on that team.

Freshman year was hard on me. I was a slow learner, I struggled to get certain tosses and picking up routines fast didn't exactly come easy to me. Despite my struggles where I was lacking I had a teammate behind me picking up my weakness as I built my strengths.

On a team like this, there's no shame in struggle — we just grew together.

Band camp was always long, and hard but there was always the sense of excitement returning back to school and the anticipation of the first practice, the new show theme, and being together as a team again. The season often felt too long while being out in the hot sun or in the freezing cold but at the end, there were always tears knowing we would have to lose a few seniors. Every year our seniors took on the role of leaders to our team. They wiped tears, took the time to individually help our younger teammates, and did everything they could to strengthen the bond we had as a team. I really saw these girls as my big sisters.

My friends outside of color guard know me well and have seen me down, but my teammates have seen me at my worse. Sweating, no makeup, crying, on the verge of quitting. Yet they never let me walk away and they were always there to dry my tears. And I did the same for them. Before walking on that field if there was any fear or doubt in myself that I had about a toss or a new move, I had a teammate there to pray over me, there was always someone there to encourage me. What we had was more than friendship.

We won together and we lost together. We built together and we grew together, as a family does.