Lifelong Girlfriends August 31, 2012

There’s something so special about “lifelong girlfriends”. You know what I mean. Those women who have known you the longest and like you anyway? Those women who met you before you really knew who you were and helped form the person you are today? Those women who know your secrets and share your history? There are some girlfriends who become your new “adult girlfriends”, but there’s something so amazingly wonderful about your girlfriends from High School.

I moved to a new town at the beginning of ninth grade. We lived in a neighborhood adjacent to the High School and began the journey of meeting people, finding friends, and trying desperately not to be a dork. I tried out for the Marching Band (a huge deal in my new hometown) and didn’t make it that year. I played in the Orchestra, tried out for (and made) the appropriate basketball and volleyball teams, and settled into our new church youth group. I made the Marching Band in my 10th grade year and decided to be the volleyball manager when I became interested in participating in our HS musicals. I was a Mat Maid (who came up with such a weird name for wrestling managers?) and sang in our church musical productions. I was busy and loved it… and I was blessed to some of the most wonderful women along the way.

During college, I didn’t spend a lot of time at home… I was busy with all the things that commanded my attention at that time. After all, these were the women who would help me figure out how to become an adult. With college completed, my attention was commanded by my first job and then my engagement/wedding, followed quickly by years away as I began to carve out my life as an adult. Being a wife and a mom gave me an identity, but my friendships were primarily child-wife centered. I had some friends who met me as an individual, but I was most seen in one of those familiar roles. I didn’t miss being back in my hometown… until this past reunion weekend when I got reacquainted with the women I met over thirty years ago.

Yes… it’s been thirty years since we graduated from High School. There have been many births, deaths, weddings, divorces, children, grandchildren, moves, returns, and LIFE. We’ve each lived the past thirty years, with varying amounts of contact with one another, but this past reunion was something really special.

I have no idea if it was just the reach of Facebook that made this reunion work so well, but I do know that I had the most incredible time reconnecting with these women. Yes… there were men in our class and yes… there were a bunch of men at our reunion, but it was the women who made the weekend so amazingly special. To me, it felt as if we all fell into a familiarity that would have taken days to create under different circumstances. We laughed until we cried… we danced any and every line dance that the DJ played for us… we sang (shouted) song lyrics that had us laughing all over again. We did drink (wow… that flavored moonshine was amazing) but it was the fact that we were together that was important. We hadn’t seen one another, as a collective group, in 30 years yet we connected in a way that I think was really special.

All too soon, our weekend was over. We went back to our respective lives and vowed to keep in touch. Thankfully, one of us decided to hold us all to that promise… and started a FB chat group we now call “My girls of CHS”. I cannot tell you how much I love this idea.

Being able to continue to keep in contact with these women, as often as we can, is such a blessing. They connect me to my roots… they keep me grounded… and they love me because they know me, and have known me, for most of my life. These are my Lifelong Girlfriends… and I am blessed to have each one of you in my life.

Everything has a lifespan August 26, 2012

Cue the words to the song by The Byrds, “Turn, Turn, Turn”.  See if you can tell where I’m going with these lyrics:

To Everything (Turn, Turn, Turn)
There is a season (Turn, Turn, Turn)
And a time to every purpose, under Heaven

A time to be born, a time to die
A time to plant, a time to reap
A time to kill, a time to heal
A time to laugh, a time to weep

(Chorus)

A time to build up, a time to break down
A time to dance, a time to mourn
A time to cast away stones, a time to gather stones together

(Chorus)

A time of love, a time of hate
A time of war, a time of peace
A time you may embrace, a time to refrain from embracing

(Chorus)

A time to gain, a time to lose
A time to rend, a time to sew
A time for love, a time for hate
A time for peace, I swear it’s not too late

I’m about to make a big change in my life with regards to where I am going to volunteer my time, but it’s taken more soul searching than I expected…

Let me first say that I am not a fan of change.   I do enjoy a challenge but I also am very happy to work behind the scenes, year after year, expanding and enhancing my role within an organization until it fits “just right”.  Maintaining the “status quo” is fine with me… for awhile.

I ran into this situation first when E was playing youth association football.  He made the decision, in eighth grade, to play lacrosse instead of football.  While his move was totally fine with us, I was upset because I had enjoyed being the Team Mom for his age group and felt that I had already committed to continuing that position for one more year.  After a bit of discussion, I decided to honor the commitment that I had made to the team and, while E played lacrosse, I was the “Team Mom with no child on the team”.  I did skip out early on the occasional practice that was cutting into dinner time that fall, but for all intents and purposes, I was present for every scrimmage, game, and team event that fall.  I had a blast and enjoyed every moment of being on those sidelines… and my boys saw a mom who followed through on a commitment she had made to a group of kids, whether they were related to me or not.

Fast forward to this year… I had joined the Board of Directors of the lacrosse program for which E played until he graduated HS.  I then continued to work for that program, as Secretary, Scheduler and “Athletic Director” for another two years.  This past spring was the end of that sixth year and I have decided that the “lifespan” of my participation with this amazing program has run its course and come to an end.  As much as I hate to leave the safety of my direct association with the people who have created and built the Richmond Shock Lacrosse program, and subsequently the Central Virginia Lacrosse League (CVLL), I believe that there are others who need to take my place and influence the direction of these programs for their own children.

Once I made this decision, the next question was “what do I do now?”  I had built a professional network of coaches, schedulers, referees, and athletic directors that I was loathe to leave the lacrosse community completely… there had to be something I could do or somewhere I could use my unique skill set.  Enter the Richmond Chapter of US Lacrosse.

I had first encountered this organization when E was selected for their Boys’ All-Star game at the end of his senior year.  This was their inaugural game and by happenstance I was their event photographer.  I followed their program from the periphery, but didn’t think about becoming involved until I was asked to consider organizing a Coaches Clinic, which never quite came to fruition, but succeeded in whetting my appetite to become involved.

Involved how was the big question now.  As I contemplated stepping away from Shock, I looked at the landscape of lacrosse in our local area and found it sorely lacking.  In my humble opinion, it’s not lacking in kids… it’s not lacking in interest… it’s lacking in direction.  My new quest was slowly presenting itself to me… I could, somehow, become involved in expanding and helping to develop this amazing sport.  Now all I had to do was figure out how to get others to allow me to become involved.

I wrote a very persuasive letter to the Chapter to explain to them that they needed a Director of Sport Development and Marketing.  With M’s gracious help, we scoured the National US Lacrosse site looking for a precedent that I could use to explain my goal of becoming involved with the Richmond Chapter.  I explained how my history and my involvement would benefit the Chapter and was eventually voted onto the Board…yea, ME!

While it’s still a very new venture for me, I am tremendously excited to be working to expand lacrosse within the reaches of the Richmond Chapter.  My goal is to expand our presence on Facebook and Twitter, keep our website as up-to-date as possible (thank GOD for M), and find out how to go about increasing training, certifications, and qualification programs for anyone who’s interested in becoming involved with lacrosse.

There is a new world opening up to me and while one door is slowly closing, this new door is bursting open with possibilities and promise.  I know I’m looking at all of this through rose-colored glasses (http://www.thefreedictionary.com/through+rose-colored+glasses) but if I focus on all that can’t happen, I’ll never see the possibilities.

Besides… the world looks so much prettier this way.

Catch-up on lacrosse

Catch-up on lacrosse.

The local paper just printed the bare-bones version of my original post “An Open Letter to the New Principal of Midlothian HS”.  Here’s the link, in case you’re interested in reading my opinion.  I was pretty excited that they decided to print my opinion.

Drinking wine can be beneficial

I read the coolest article recently, relating alcohol intake to bone density in women over 50.  Seriously… there’s actual scientific info to back this up.  Check out the following article (http://www.lifeslittlemysteries.com/2665-alcohol-bone-health.html) and read the specifics for yourself. 

While I’m not saying that everyone should go out and chug down two glasses of wine a day, I do like the idea that there are positive benefits to partaking in something I already enjoy.  Granted, I’m not quite in the article’s target demographic yet, but I’ll be there at some point and I might as well start learning all I can about how to increase or maintain bone density as I get older.  My family history allows for this to be fairly important, so I’ll be paying closer attention than I might have otherwise.

Hopefully you find this article to be as helpful as I did.

From the Bottom of a Wine Bottle August 7, 2012

I’ve just started another blog.  This one will be focused on wine, recipes, tastings, etc… all the things that people have been asking me about for the past year, but I’ve dismissed as something that was either too involved or would take up too much time.

After much thought, I decided that this was something I wanted to do.  I’m not going to link the winery where I work at this point, nor will I link their twitter account.  I just want to post some information that I’ve been collecting over the past few years… and hopefully de-mystify “wine” in general.  I hope people will consider following this new blog and sharing it with others.  The address is:

fromthebottomofawinebottle.wordpress.com

Thanks for taking a moment to check it out…