I was that kid growing up who tried every sport before I found the one that meant the most to me. I spent years on the soccer team, kind of just going through the motions, giving me something to do in my free time. I was on our park district swim team goofing around and swimming just for fun. The summer before 6^th grade I decided to try cross country. I did cross country all throughout middle school, and decided to stick with it once I got to high school. Now, I wasn’t the fastest and I had a love/hate relationship with running, but being on our high school’s cross country team was one of the best decisions that I have ever made.

To my former teammates: I can’t even begin to say how much of an impact you all had on me throughout high school, and even still to this day. There were days that I didn't think that I could make it through practice. Days that I wanted to just give up. But every day you guys were my motivation. You were my motivation to come to practice and work harder. You guys pushed me to be my best and believed in me, even when I was having a hard time believing in myself. Even though some of you started out as complete strangers, while some of you I had known for years, the end result was still the same.

Every single one of you ended as family. I loved our moments of bonding over the ridiculous things that Coach would say or the funny things one of us would say on a long run in 97-degree weather, where the end couldn’t come soon enough. I miss our Friday night pasta dinners where the answer to, “should I eat more pasta?” was always yes and the sharing of funny stories that happened to us throughout the week. As a family, we were always up together at the crack of dawn, with no makeup on and half asleep. We saw each other sweaty, smelly, bruised, tired, in tears, and in times of happiness. We endured hard workouts, long runs, and bad races together. Together we were one. One team with one dream. We truly have seen the very best and the very worst of each other. I loved cross country, but I loved being on the team because of you. Although we are no longer a team, the memories that we made together will last a lifetime. You guys made each cross country season bearable. You made each season memorable. You made it all worth it.