my dog skip

It was an unusually hot April at the end of my seventh grade lacrosse career. I didn’t know it at the start of the game, but by the second quarter all of my hard work and hours of practice would pay off when I scored my first goal. I was wearing my freshly cleaned #3 blue and gold Brentwood Bruins jersey and had rubbed the black paint on my cheeks. I love how dirty the jersey gets by the end of the game, covered in mud and grass stains; it’s almost like the dirt on your shirt shows how hard you worked. That year we were called the dream team of lacrosse. The major players on the dream team with me were, twins Taylor and Jackson Vroon and Parkes Grisham. Taylor was middy, worked well together on and off the field. His brother, Jackson, was the goalie. He and I were also friends but he always supported me and wanted me to score. Sometimes I even thought he wanted me to score, even more than I did. Our all-star was Parkes Grisham, his cousin plays for the Broncos so I guess sports was in his genes, he was leading scorer on our team and it was the combination of all of us that got me to my goal. We were playing Montgomry Bell Academy, MBA we called them. The first quarter wasn’t anything to speak about. By the beginning of the second quarter, the score was one nothing and we weren’t the ones winning. Anyone who has ever played lacrosse knows that even a one-point lead is a lot in this sport. It was the beginning of the second quarter and I was starting with a face-off. I crouched down in front of the other player, sweat dripping off his maroon jersey, our sticks were on the ground in front of us, with the ball between us, beckoning me to scrape it away. I was nervous because the other guy was bigger than me but I was excited to start playing. The ref yelling SET and blowing his whistle brought me out of my head and into the game. I stood straight up and pushed the other guy out of the way and tried to kick the ball away from him but he knocked me down. I