Saint Mary's University of Minnesota Athletics

It really doesn’t feel like it’s my time to start writing a Senior Salute. It seems like my swimming career at has just started to heat up. Considering this is only my third year on the St. Mary’s Swimming and Diving team, that makes a little bit of sense. First, I’ll give you all a little background knowledge about me before I start talking about my Saint Mary’s experience.

When I was in 8th grade, I decided to try swimming for North St. Paul. My sisters were both on the team and since I was a pretty good swimmer, I thought I’d give it a try. I swam from 8th grade until my junior year. I decided to end me swimming career at that point because of a nagging shoulder injury. Never again did I expect to find myself back in a speedo and cap. When I decided to go on to the U of M after senior year, I knew for sure that my swimming career was over.

After completing my freshman year at the U of M, I transferred to Saint. Mary’s. When people learn this fact for the first time they often ask the question, “Why did you transfer? Didn’t you like the U of M?” For the first month on campus, I had a really hard time coming up with an adequate response to that question. Leaving the comfort of being near home and all of my favorite music venues, along with my best friends, it didn’t take long for me to question whether I had made a mistake transferring to Saint Mary’s.

My older sister Andrea was a pretty big part of the decision to transfer (though I wouldn’t have admitted it at the time) because she convinced me that I would actually be able to compete at the college level in swimming and get a chance to play water polo. And because I had a sibling attending Saint Mary’s, I got some pretty nice scholarships, too.

So for the past three years, I’ve been trying to figure out a better answer to that question than, “I got some pretty nice scholarships.” Looking back on my time here, I realize that I didn’t start enjoying Saint Mary’s until swimming started up. At that time, I made some new friends (Tom in particular) and decided that this school could be a good experience for me. At the U of M, I could never have become a swim team captain, get on the school record board, maintain a 3.8 GPA, and I never would have met some truly wonderful people.
 
A wise man once said, “You won’t remember the workouts, but you’ll leave Saint Mary’s with some stories to tell the grandkids.” This statement couldn’t be truer. I’ll always remember the NO NADAR signs on that beach in Puerto Rico that we swam in so frequently and that pool that you couldn’t see five feet in front of your face underwater. And I definitely won’t forget the surfing! I’ll always remember the beauty of Hawaii, with rainbows over the swimming pool in the morning. And how about swimming practice snorkeling along with tropical fish on Christmas Day? Those things won’t leave my mind easily. But what about the little things? The day-to-day things are what made this team what it is: futile attempts at winning the goggle toss each day, the “ducks” in the locker room, and the jokes that Coach would tell us at 6 a.m. that no one would laugh at because we were too tired!

I don’t think I could express in words how Saint Mary’s has made me the person I am today. So without further ado, I need to give thanks to a few special people:

To Tom, for always pushing me to work harder, especially when I didn’t want to. And for making my butterfly what it is today. Oh yeah, and for being a faithful friend, too!
 
To Brian, for teaching me valuable lessons about friendship and camaraderie and with always coming up with ways to make us all laugh.

To my sisters, for getting me into swimming and Andrea especially for encouraging me to attend Saint Mary’s.

To my parents, for sitting through three hours of swimming in order to see me in the water for less than a minute. Oh, and raising me. That too!

To Coach, for being the best coach anyone could ask for. I may be a much better swimming than I was in high school now, but I also feel like you’ve made me into a better person as well. You always have been very understanding, supportive, entertaining (especially way too early in the morning!), and a great mentor that I will never forget.

And to the rest of the team, thank you! We all know how hard it is to swim alone and swimming with all of you has made the yards and the early mornings a heck of a lot more fun. Reading over this, I realized that this thank you to the team could never do any justice to the feelings that I actually have. You, and those who have graduated before you, have made this my favorite team I’ve ever been a part of and I can now honestly say that I love Saint Mary’s because of the times we’ve had. Thank you for helping me find a place where I truly belong.

And to those of you with one, two, or three years left of college… sometimes it seems like an easy choice between hitting that snooze button a few too many times and getting up at 5:40 a.m., or going out the night before morning practice rather than falling asleep at 10 p.m. Stay committed to the team and yourself. Swimming will be an essential part of your college experience and you’ll never forget it. You’ve got some great years ahead!