For many years springtime has meant the start of a new tennis season for me. The slight warmness in the air despite the cool breeze was my favorite weather. This feeling meant it was almost time for those long match days and uniform tan lines with some of my best friends.
This year – as we start to get some warmer temps – I’m reminiscing on the days when I got to play. Senior night last year was hard, but I feel like I really took those few “lasts” of my career for granted. I knew I would miss the team, my coaches, and playing; but never expected to miss being on the court so much.
I’ve heard others say that the transition from being an athlete in high school to becoming a regular student in college is hard. I understand now just what they mean and I’m sure some of you have as well. To make the transition a bit easier for all of us going through this change, I thought I’d share a few things that have helped me.
- Find Hobbies
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This is one that I struggled with for most of my first semester here at VT. I didn’t expect to have so much time on my hands, and frankly, I had no idea what to do with it. It wasn’t like I could go play tennis alone – that was previously the thing I did in most of my free time. Although running took up some of my time it began to get colder as the semester went on and that slowly became not an option I wanted to choose. Randomly I decided to give crocheting a shot and – let me just say – I took it and ran. I LOVE crocheting now. In my spare time – if I’m in my dorm – that’s most likely what you’ll find me doing. I taught myself in a few weeks by watching youtube videos and once you get the pattern it’s really not hard at all. In my spare time, I’ve made coasters, and flowers and I’m even working on making a tank top right now. The possibilities are endless with this craft.
- Stay Active
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I have always been a super active person. Playing sports and working out have been a big part of my life. I knew coming to college I would need to work a little bit harder to stay active due to the fact that there were no “mandatory” practices I’d be attending. To help with this – and my mental health while in college – I began running. I would go for runs about two or three times a week – which even led to my mom and I running the Veterans Thankful Three-Miler here at Tech. Running became a great outlet for me and helped me stay close to the athlete I am used to being. I also started going to the gym a few days a week working on different muscles I might have never focused on before. It’s been really fun to try new exercises, go to some classes, and feel great while I’m at it.
- Play When You Can
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Although I might not have the team aspect of competitiveness anymore – I still try to play tennis whenever I have someone to hit with. When I go home for breaks I love to take my racket and find some old teammates to hit with. That has been my favorite thing so far, getting to catch up with my old doubles partner and playing tennis as we use to year-round. I feel that this has really helped ease me into the fact that this March I won’t be getting ready to start matches. Having this time to just play noncompetitively also helped me find a new kind of love for the sport. I’m no longer focused on winning the match or fighting for a higher seed, but just playing because I love the game. I also found that I played much stronger when I wasn’t so focused on the end result.
So if you find yourself struggling to accept that you are now a NARP – non-athletic regular person – just know you are most definitely not alone. Go for a run, join the gym, or start an absolutely random hobby that you’ve always wanted to try. Who knows, maybe you’ll find your new thing.