So today I heard a few things that struck a chord in my heart, and I thought I would go into deep sentimental mode.


~~~~



Earlier this evening my sports teams had the opportunity to be interviewed for a local news channel. It was a really interesting thing that happened, and in my perspective quite miraculous in fact. Because you never really hear about the teams, so for them to want to hear from us was a blessing.

You know, the questions were pretty basic. "Why did you join the team?" "What is your favorite thing about it?" etc. I myself did not get the opportunity to be interviewed, but it gave me the chance to hear the answers given by my teammates.

If I watch other interviews by public school kids on sports teams, the answers from them are about like ours were.

"I joined because i wanted to play." is the one I heard most often, from watching other interviews to these tonight. And I view that as awesome, that you want to play and you have the opportunity for it. But there is something I wanted to address that I would have said had i gotten to speak tonight.


Those answers are true for some people. They genuinely want to play sports for the love of the game, and they get that here and anywhere else. They were born with the athleticism in them 90% of the time. I really do think that is a great thing.

For some of us, it's a different story. I've been asked before, "Why do you play sports?"


I'll tell you.


One day, I was at a party for a friend. I was 11 years old, and I had pretty much no friends. I was at a table, signing a paper for my friend, and a man walks up to me. He says to me, "You look like you could play volleyball, do you want to join our team?" And seeing as I had never given the slightest thought to even playing, I didn't know how to respond. Then his wife walks up, and we started talking. I don't know if she remembers this happening at all. But it was then and there that I knew I should join.

And I did.

But here's the thing:

I never once considered joining the team because i wanted to. I didn't join because I wanted to learn this sport, heck, I had never played any sport in my life!

I joined because I needed to.

I joined because at that time, I didn't know God. I was very, very lost. and I needed a family. This team and these people gave me the family that I lacked.

I joined the team because I needed to.

I needed them.

I needed Him.

God sent me the family and the one thing that would bring me out of that place. I needed that desperately.

The woman that convinced me to play after her husband asked is now one of the people that I love the most in my life. She is like my second mother, and I have gathered a whole group of people that i love just as much. I would never, ever trade this life i am living now for even something slightly different.

And that's alright with me.

This here is my family. What I have now in this program is more of a family to me than some of my actual family is. God knew this is where I needed to be.

I never want to be considered the kid who joined the team just to play and get some extracurriculars in there.

I play for the love of the game.

I play for the moments when you feel the pressure and you're two points behind on match point and the stands are on edge, and then suddenly your team wins. The adrenaline is what makes it great.
I play for the moments after those hard games, even the losses. The long van rides, the late night Wendy's trips, and then playing card games and singing the rest of the way home. I play for the moments in which you need encouragement and then you are the encourager.

The bruises, floor burns, smiles, sweat. victory, and losses. All of it.

I play for the love of the game.

And for the family that came with it.

That there will never change.





And to think I am here, nearly five years later, all because I did something I never intended on doing.... isn't that something?






-Liv