Your First Day of Lacrosse: LtN Supporter, Tony
September 27, 2017… My first day of lacrosse.
Yes, you read the year correctly. I was 25 years old. My friends grew up playing lacrosse, but lacrosse was during track season, and my parents were not having it. After high school I went to the military for 6 years. When I got out I had the choice to stay with track which I had been my life, or play “the fastest sport on two feet”. I wanted to put that theory to the test…
September 27, the team president gave me his stick, a ball, and directed me to go play wall ball… first lesson I learned in lacrosse? Never take one ball to play wall ball. Needless to say the first round of wall ball was short.. I don’t think I caught the ball once that whole day. Less than 6 months later, I was starting on the wing, for The University of Miami. Short stick defensive middie. only player on the team that finished the season without spending 1 second in the penalty box. No, it's not because I rode the bench.
There were 2 moments when I knew that: “lax is life”.
1: I was having an awful day.. went out side, threw the ball as hard as I could at the wall, kept stick extended in place, and ball came right back as if I was playing paddle ball. The sound the ball made when it smacked the back of my net had me hooked. The harder you throw the ball, the faster it comes back to you. There is no greater stress relief in sports than wall ball in lacrosse.
2: I was having problems with the GI bill paying for my school, someone broke my laptop and didn’t tell me, someone stole my phone and my wallet, someone rear ended my car making it non-drivable, and the army was not paying me for housing… hell was burning around me.. what did i I do? just played wall ball longer. 4 hours a day sometimes.. nothing better to do…. then i lost my stick, and the world stopped spinning. I had a panic attack. iPhone X: stolen, didn’t care. car: wrecked, didn’t care. Paychecks: weren’t coming, didn’t care. Laptop: broken, didn’t care. I could not even go have a beer with my friends because my ID was stolen, didn’t care…However, life without a stick, and no means to replace, it terrified me.
That was just 5 months after the day I started.
Today makes 10 months, not even a year, and I am in the process of relocating to Latin America in December to grow the game… lacrosse saved my life, set me free… through me, I am going to allow it to do the same for others.
(Good thing this wasn’t “first goal”, or I wouldn’t have been able to contribute.)
Your First Day of Lacrosse
Lacrosse the Nations is starting up a new campaign this week. It's called "Your First Day of Lacrosse."
It's in honor of our approaching trip to Panama, and the children we will have the privilege of working with down there. This will be the FIRST time these kids will ever see the game of lacrosse. Some may absolutely hate it, some will love it. "Your First Day of Lacrosse" is a campaign that's aimed to honor the moments of discovery that await these kids. And to reconnect all of YOU - LtN's supporters, donors, and believers - to this first moment of discovery for you: the first time you experienced something that you knew you'd love for the remainder of your life.
When was the first time you ever saw a lacrosse stick?
Did you pick it up? Try and play?
Did you look on with admiration?
Did you sit there wondering what the heck those kids were using sticks to throw a ball around for?
No matter how familiar or how foreign the sport of lacrosse was to you, at one point in your life, on one day, it was something brand new and exciting - something that made you feel a certain way.
As we prepare to launch our pilot programs in Panama, I've started thinking a lot about what makes programs successful, what creates the best experience and provides the most benefit to those involved. I remembered back to when I was first introduced to the game of lacrosse, and how it made me feel to play on my very first day. It was tricky, it was cool, it was fun, and it was different. Within the first practice, I was able to pick up catching and throwing pretty easily, and I was pretty pumped as a little 5th grader showing off my skills to novice 6th and 7th graders. Lacrosse made me feel like no other sport had so far. As a young girl it gave me confidence and put a smile on my face.
As I grew, so did my love for it - it became a way to socialize, to compete, to learn from and with others. It inevitably made me a better person, got me to an incredible college (Go 'Ders), and introduced me to people who have changed my life in every sense of the word. Lacrosse allowed me to travel to Nicaragua, where I learned more about myself in 13 months than I had thus far in my 22 years. During my time there I shared my every-day life with absolute strangers - incredible kids, families, and role models (@Normdaddy) that I would NEVER have met otherwise. I can trace so many of my attributes, so many of my favorite memories, so many of the most challenging but rewarding moments of my life back to my first day of lacrosse.
"Your First Day of Lacrosse" is a campaign we are running over our social media from now until the end of our summer trips to Panama. We will be sharing stories of our players, staff members, volunteers, and friends on what they remember about their first day of lacrosse. We hope that you all will be able to use these stories to jog your own memory of your first days. Share these memories us. Post it and tag us, recount it with your friends, respond to this blog post, whatever you'd like! Remember your first day of lacrosse with admiration, and be sure to reflect on where you have come since that day. We will be asking our new kiddos in Panama these same questions after their first day of lacrosse, in hopes that this will be a time that they look back on one day with the same nostalgia and gratitude that we do.
Young LtN Advocates Stay Active in Sports Philanthropy
It's always inspiring to see players take initiative to support something they care about. This year, we were honored to hear that LtN advocates and Amped lacrosse players Bray, Ben, Jasper, Jack and Drew wanted to organize an event to benefit LtN's mission from their own home town.
Amped lacrosse has been an incredible supporter of and contributor to the impact LtN's programs have from dedicating their club seasons, to donating their time to volunteer at our international sites. But this year, Bray, Ben, Jasper, Jack and Drew wanted to take their role in sport philanthropy to the next level. Last month, these guys organized a youth lacrosse camp in Norfolk, VA - not only to share their love and knowledge of the game with youth in their community, but also to benefit young players they have come to know in our Nicaraguan communities. By organizing, promoting, and coaching the camp, these players have done more than help grow the game - they have united the lacrosse communities countries apart.
Amped player, Bray, reflected on his experience the day of the camp:
This clinic was something that I was lucky and grateful to be a part of, and it was a blast running it. The clinic benefited two things crucial to lacrosse and the lacrosse community. It helped spread the game to those who haven’t been around it and it benefited a large nonprofit organization that has a international impact on less fortunate people in the lacrosse community.
This clinic was a great learning experience for me. It helped me learn some of the great things that Lacrosse the Nations does, along with the logistics of putting together an large event. From insurance, to public relations, the clinic was a long, thought-out process that I couldn’t have put together without the help, teaching, and advising of those around me. In the end, it worked out well. We raised over $500 for Lacrosse the Nations and raised awareness for what Lacrosse the Nations does all over Hampton Roads. It was truly an honor to be able to run this clinic.
- Bray Hollowell
Bray not only took the lead on the behind-the scenes tasks of the clinic, but he pulled together other local guys not playing for Amped yet committed to the cause of Lacrosse the Nations that want to help them with the clinic. He even recruited Amped alumni players to join in. It's amazing how quickly the lacrosse community in Norfolk acme to together in support of the boys' efforts. It resulted in an evening full of fun, laughter and the joining of some incredible causes.
