A Family is a Family is a Family Even in Times of Trouble

My family!  I gotta say I really love them because we get a long so well.  This is the track family I've always wanted.  This may not be entirely everyone but it is mainly the ones I am around the most (the sprinters/jumpers).  My senior is the year I want to do the best and get out with a bang!  Only thing is I can't do that with an unstable relationship of my track family.  Even though it is only September and we have many more months to go that can potentially have upsets, I am not worried because the way things are going now...we can handle it.  We really don't want any drama because drama hinders all of our performances in some way.  I get affected a lot by stuff like that therefore I try to be careful in what I say and do.  Plus, I'm a captain!  So I gotta be in the right state of mind.  Coach did a great job recruiting this year and I'll be so sad when my year is up.  My buddy Aja (she a cross country runner now) told me to red shirt, aka not compete this year so I can stay another.  That is not in my plan of success so I will just sniff sniff, suck it up and enjoy the time I have now. 

Here we are supporting our fellow teammates who are in the midst of the cross country season.  Most of the time, well all of the time our XC teammates go to away meets and never have a home meet but this year was our FIRST home meet ever!  Wow is all I have to say.  Every year the track season gets a home meet but not cross country, I don't know whats up with that but I'm glad they finally got a chance to have one here because we love to support are teammates when possible. 

It's such a great feeling to know you have people that you can call your family even if they are not your blood.  I swear if I did not have track in my life I would not have experience such family ties with a bunch of used to be strangers ever.  Last Friday was a crazy night in the beginning but with my ingenious ideas I was able to get my teammates to bond more.  Go me!  Go captain!

It started off with all of us going to this party where JCSU (a HPCU) students were also invited.  As soon as I saw them get off the party bus I knew some trouble was brewing.  Probably about a half hour of dancing and warming up to the music there was a fight.  The fight got semi-serious and they stopped unexpectedly.  Some people saw one of the guys try to get something out of his pocket which implied he had a gun.  He backed up some into the crowd which I was backing up on and he said "I can shoot up everybody up in here!".  I have never experienced anything like that and I was scared because no way do I want to get shot let alone any of my teammates that I love.  After he was carried out I was hardly in the mood to dance anymore.  Standing around to most of the songs I started to warm up again since some of my teammates were getting warmed up again.  Some were just standing around as much as I was.  Another hour into the party we found out there was a shooting outside of the club.  That really made me not want to be there.  The party ended up ending early (Thank God) but even before that we couldn't leave just as yet because the police had ordered that no one could get out until they cleared the area of the shooting.  Because it was so early (12am early for a party night) I felt like we were robbed of our pockets for this club.  I decided to invite my 'mates to my apt, asking my roommate first if it was okay.  She said sure seeing as she loves when people come over but when I actually announced that people can come over she got all worried.  Why? Because her room was messy.  She trips me out but we ended up having a better time at my apartment than the club.  Plus it was safer!

That night added on to my list of crazy experiences (not that I have much anyways).  Its not something I ever want to get into again and some of us were saying we don't even want to go out to another party for a long time.  But I just told them we really shouldn't go to a party in that area (it was the dangerous party of Charlotte) and also go to a party where JCSU is invited.  That just spells T-R-O-U-B-L-E!
Here we are chillen in my apartment.  We danced a bit, talked a lot, and even had a little sing-a-long when we was getting tired.  Once 5am creeped up everybody was entirely too tired to go back to their dorms/apt.  So I hosted a sleepover as well! :-)
Here goes my teammate trying to keep the covers on him in the morning.  This boy is a fool but he cracks me up in the process.