In high school, I was involved with many things. A few of those things being sports. I'm mentioning sports because now that I don't have them in my life I've noticed a few things. Those few things include: my drab body, a lack of team bonds, the loss of the feeling of nervous excitement, and my sickeningly pale skin. All of these factored into my high school life and now my college life in their own ways.
Okay, so listen, I know my body is perfectly fine, but let me tell you it's been better. I played volleyball from 7th grade to my senior year of high school. I also did track and field from 9th grade to 12th grade. All the running and jumping did wonders for me. I could actually do active things without dying. I love that now when I'm walking up stairs to get to class I'm out of breath when I go to sit in the classroom. I just ABSOLUTELY love that! On a real note though, I wasn't anything too special in the sports I played so I couldn't continue with them in college. I know what you're saying, "Just go to the gym." Who do you think I am? I can't do that, nor do I really have the time to do it enough that there will be any sort of results. Sports were just a lot easier in high school than college, that's a very obvious fact.
Something I really miss about sports is the bond that comes with them. In volleyball, there had to be some sort of connection with the players for there to be good results in the game. A lot of communicating goes on on the court. I made amazing friendships through sports in general. There was a chance to become friends with people in your grade and other grades in a great setting. That can happen at college as well, but the settings aren't always as great and there isn't the same kind of team bond that comes with sports.
With volleyball, there was excitement, but not so much nervousness. A lot of nervousness came with track and field. It is literally impossible to duplicate this feeling with anything else. The mixture of nervous and excitement is crazy. It's like you wanna throw up, but you also want to win everything right then and there. In 9th and 10th grade, when I wasn't lazy and actually ran track events and didn't just jump in sand and throw things in the ground, I would get this feeling all the time right before the races began. I miss this feeling a lot. It makes me miss the sports even more.
Track and field is an outside sport. I was obviously outside for it a lot. The sun was beating on me constantly and that caused me to have a skin tone that didn't make me look like a ghost. I am pale, like pale pale. Being outside so much made my skin look healthy and normal. The obvious solution to this in college would be just to go out in the sun, but I can't just do that. What I mean by that is I would need to stay out there for extended periods of time pretty much everyday and I don't have the time for that. Yes, I could go to a tanning bed, but I would enjoy not risking skin cancer. I also could fake tan, but I think I'd look better as a ghost than an orange flavored popsicle.
Physically, I was a much better person in high school. This is all really because of sports. Sports are just easier in high school and offer a lot of benefit. They offer even more benefit in college than in high school, but when you go from playing two sports to none it really catches up to you. I'm sure I will get used to all these things eventually, but while I am still in my freshman year of college I will continually think about how much more fit I was as a high schooler.
