While many see senior spring as another chance to get outside and enjoy the sunlight, for one group of seniors, Spring term offers opportunities to engage in activities that have heretofore been precluded by the all-encompassing commitment of a varsity sport. Though these seniors love their sports, fall and winter athletes are excited to finally get to experience campus the way the rest of us non-athletes do.
Recently, I sat down with four seniors who recently finished their Dartmouth sports careers -- soccer players Carolyn Wendell '08 and Amanda Webb '08, ice hockey player Carrie Thompson '08 and skier Hannah Tsai '08 -- to hear their thoughts on their newfound freedom from their four-year athletic commitments.
Wendell is taking advantage of her senior spring by taking two classes for the first time. One of her classes, photography, she said she was not able to take while playing soccer because "practice takes up too much time." In addition, Wendell is taking a Collis Miniversity class on Mediterranean cooking.
Wendell said she is happy to be able to take advantage of activities she was never done before.
"When I was playing soccer, I would always get blitzes about really cool things and would just delete them because all I had time was soccer and school, and I was taking hard classes, so I never had time to do anything," she said.
"But now I actually go to many of them, whether it's a movie at the Hop, a guest speaker for a class -- I'm an art history major so I've been going to a lot of the symposiums at the Hood and openings of exhibitions."
From a wellness standpoint, no longer having practice has allowed Wendell to do things that non-athletes might take for granted.
"[Now I can] actually get nine hours of sleep on some nights. I have never gotten that much sleep at Dartmouth."
Though she professes thorough enjoyment of her new free time, Wendell added that she does not regret any part of her four years playing soccer for Dartmouth.
"I would never have given it up. The power of the team itself and being part of something so much larger than yourself was an amazing experience and something I will hold with me the rest of my life. It was the greatest accomplishment of my whole life," she said.
Webb adds, "Your Dartmouth experience is what you make of it -- for the last three and a half years the focus has been on school and soccer.
"Now that I'm done with both I'm focusing on enjoying my last couple of months that I have with my friends before they kick us out of here in June."
Webb is not taking classes this term, which certainly leaves her with more freedom, though she works 25 hours per week.
Thompson, in her first term of freedom, is attempting to take advantage of the large quantities of time many of us find ourselves with every term, though she admits "I haven't really learned how to deal with my free time yet."
Thompson echoes the others in saying, "Finally having more freedom, it's more free time and made me sad realizing all the things I could have done but never have the opportunity because I had hockey all the time, even though I love it. But now it's too late."
Similar to the other athletes I had a chance to talk to, Thompson is glad she had the opportunity to play a varsity sport at Dartmouth.
Thompson, along with her senior teammates, intends to dress in crazy outfits and cheer on her team during some of their workouts this spring, snarkily commenting, "We're just trying to be encouraging, that's all."
Thompson's roommate, Tsai, says she is "amazed that people at Dartmouth have all this free time to do things."
Tsai points out, "It's nice not to have to worry about how your body will perform physically. If you stay up late one night, you can feel terrible the next day and it won't matter."
For Tsai, these small luxuries do not compare to the rewards of being part of a Dartmouth varsity team.
"There is nothing like the bond of being on a team," she said.
While these women are learning to appreciate many of the aspects of Dartmouth life that the rest of us take for granted during four years here, they have left me for an appreciation for both their commitment and for how lucky I was to have as much free time as I had the last four years.
Then again, I never got to be a varsity athlete. They did.
