Defeating Meeting

My sophomore year of high school I was privileged to be the JV cheerleading captain. At this time sophomores were not allowed to be on Varsity for cheerleading so it was an exciting time to be moving on from the freshman squad and to be captain of my friends and peers at a higher level. 

Becoming captain did not change many aspects of how I treated everyone else or even how we all worked together. The title just put me more as the person to keep everyone on target and to make quick decisions if needed. However, about halfway through football season Taylor (the Co-Captain and one of my best friends) and I decided it would be fun to sneak in our coaches desk and look at the homecoming nomination votes for the senior cheerleaders. At the time it did not seem like a big deal, because we had looked in our coaches desk many times before, but of course this time was a little bit different and we ended up getting in trouble with not only our coaches but with the school principal. Our coaches understood that we were not trying to change any of the votes or do anything bad, we were just being dumb as usual. However, because one of the other cheerleaders saw us and told her mom, action had to be taken. 

Both Taylor and I had to have individual meetings with the coaches and tell our sides of the story. It was difficult telling the different actions we had made knowing that they were not what our coaches wanted to hear. When it was all said and done all the two of them could say was that they were sorry that they had to do this but they had to remove us both from captain. Mortification was plastered all over our faces. Yes we got in trouble, but the subject that made it necessary for us to hide our heads was that we caused enough trouble to be downgraded. That was the first time in my two years of knowing Taylor that I saw her shed a tear.

The next step of the process was the most difficult to gulp down. Telling our teammates the consequences was terrifying. I had to look my best friends in the face, the girls who had believed in me so much that they lifted me above themselves, and tell them that I had let them down. I could hardly spit the words out, but I knew it would better for me to tell them than my coach. 

Looking back it is such a dumb occurrence all together but I will never forget the pit in my stomach throughout this time. It has challenged me to question my decisions before I make them rather than act on a whim.