Growing Up Playing Sports

            Growing up I was always surrounded by sports in one way or anther. Being that my family has always been big sport fanatics, I learned to love sports at a young age. My mom was a big sports player, as well as my aunts and uncles, so I always heard stories about them from when they were in high school and how much they loved to play the game. Sports was something that was always on the TV in my house when I was growing up, so eventually I became interested and wanted to play myself. One sport in particular that I have learned to love and play is field hockey.
             Field hockey was the one sport that almost every girl in my family played. My mom was a good field hockey player when she was in school, and when my sisters and I got old enough to play we all followed in her steps and began to play field hockey as well. My mom had us girls out there hitting the ball and getting involved when we were rather young so we could get a feel for the game. She loved the game and she knew she would love for us to play as well. Both of my sisters started to play when they reached high school and continued playing till their senior year. I loved to go and watch their games and every time I would watch one I just couldn't wait till I could play on a real team too. I was around 11 or 12 years when I really started playing field hockey for the first time. I was in 6th grade and joined the schools youth field hockey team. It was a program that they just started so I was really excited and happy to finally able to become involved and learn the game. This helped me get the basic idea of field hockey so when I reached 7th grade the following year I could join the junior high team. Once I started playing in 7th grade on a real team, with real games I developed a strong feel for the game. As I got older I became better and better at the game and by 9th grade I was already playing on the varsity team. Although I was a little nervous, I managed to get by my first varsity game just fine and continued playing varsity field hockey till my senior year in high school.