Sessions with Sydney is a weekly column by features editor Sydney Ray. For more installments of Sydney’s ideas, opinions and ramblings, check out the opinions page, and check back every Friday for a new issue.
Ever since I can remember, I have wanted to be a cheerleader. I do not have any specific reasons why; it is kind of an unexplainable feeling, but it is present nonetheless.
When I came to Fresno Christian as a sophomore, I was unable to try out for cheer because the tryouts had been in the spring of my freshman year, at which time I did not yet know that I was going to be an FC student. In a sense, I missed this opportunity, but by no fault of my own.
Then this year, I became excited when I heard the latest cheer news: more girls were needed on the squad and the coaches would be holding another set of tryouts for girls who wanted to join.
A friend of mine who had quit the squad last year decided to join again and offered to help me practice. I have never cheered before, so I would need to practice quite a few of the tricky movements cheerleaders so deftly perform.
Unfortunately, I was never able to get together with this friend to practice, for which I blame my busy schedule. Having to work two jobs, go to FC, work as an editor of The Feather and attend Willow International keeps me very busy.
But the bottom line is that I did not prioritize in a manner that allowed me to spend some time practicing for the tryouts, and thus did not try out. It is something I regret to this day, and probably will for quite some time in the future.
Friends and family members have both asked me why being on the cheer team was so important to me, but I cannot put my finger on the reason why.
Maybe it is because I like the cute outfits the girls wear. Maybe it is because I wish I was more athletic and flexible.
But most likely, it is because being a cheerleader was the way I envisioned my teenage self when I was younger, and tearing myself away from my childish thoughts means realizing that I have not lived up to my own expectations. In a sense, it’s heart-breaking!
That being said, participating in cheer is not really that important in the scheme of my life. “Life goes on,” as they say.
Sure, life does go on. But whether it is a smaller thing, like being a part of the cheer team, or a huge disappointment, like somebody getting rejected from their dream college, missing opportunities is never a fun experience.
The most unfortunate part of missed opportunities is that life moves forward, and at a rapid pace. These are memories that we as students, teachers, parents and regular people are making – or failing to make – and we will never have a chance to go back and encounter the adventures of life again. Life does not give out do-overs freely.
And it is much worse to realize that when we realize we are wasting our chances, we have no concept of what we aren’t getting to experience.
We are completely blind, like the prisoners in Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave,” whose eyes are accustomed to the darkness and naively do not wish to leave because the sunlight will be painful at first. We cannot comprehend the benefits of knowledge that outweigh the temporary pain from the light.
This Christmas season, I want to try something new. I want to take a new experience and walk it around the block a few times. I want to live a little.
I will not be held back by my own hang-ups, nor by the judgment of those around me. And I will thoroughly enjoy these new experiences that are certainly headed my way.
