It was finally here. The day I had been waiting for since I first made the decision that I wanted to play pee-wee football when I was 5 years old. Every kid who plays football dreams about the day when he gets to suit up on varsity for whatever high school he attends and begin to make his run for a state championship.

Now it was about 30 minutes before my first varsity football game, and surprisingly I didn’t feel nervous whatsoever. All the guys in the locker room around me were starting to get those pre-game jitters in anticipation of the task ahead, yet somehow I felt no nerves.

Eventually after waiting around in the locker room for what felt like an eternity, it was time to hit the field for warm-ups. As I jogged out onto the field and began to get loose, I started to look around and notice my surroundings.

We practiced on the game field everyday and had even scrimmaged on the field just a week prior to the game, but on that day I got a view of the stadium I had never seen before. It seemed bigger and everything I heard seemed so much louder than I had ever experienced. How could I focus on what was happening on the field when there was this whirlwind of activity going on all around me? Yet still, for some reason, I didn’t feel nervous.

Once warm-ups concluded, we went back into the locker room to wait before coming back out for the national anthem and the moment we had all been waiting for: kickoff. I took a seat in the locker room and began to survey the area around me once again.

I saw guys going to go throw up because they were overcome with nerves and others staring off into space with the most intense look I had ever seen. At this point, I still showed no emotion toward the game. I began to wonder if there was something wrong with me as I actually started to want to have the feeling of being on the verge of throwing up because of my nerves. After a bit of waiting, I heard a whistle signaling time to run out onto the field.

As I jogged out into the stadium, I saw just how many people were in the crowd and had an awestruck moment. I had never played in front of such a large crowd and was put into a momentary shock. I could hear sound it seemed for two miles, like it was amplified right into my ear. As I processed what was around me, I hadn’t even realized that I had run through the banner and was lined up for the national anthem.

At this point as the anthem was blaring around me, I started to become overcome with an array of emotions. It was the weirdest feeling I had ever felt. It was like I wanted to cry; at the same time I had so much energy and excitement, I felt like I could have sprinted a mile.

Finally it was time for kickoff. I was on the kickoff return team, and we were returning the ball so I was gonna be on the field for the first play of the year for the Smithson Valley Rangers as we prepared for our journey to state. That thought hit me just seconds before I ran out onto the field and filled me with more nerves than I could imagine.

As I jogged out onto the field I began to cough uncontrollably, which then turned into a dry heave. I went from thinking about what a special moment this was gonna be for me to trying to focus on not throwing up on the field in front of all these people who came to watch.

The ball was kicked and we returned it to about the 40-yard line — a huge play — and suddenly, all the nerves I had felt shifted back to uncontrollable excitement. I was ready to get the game rolling and go out and compete when all the momentum I had built for myself came to a screeching halt.

Lightning struck down and delayed the game, which would typically be no biggie. But in this case the lightning never stopped and the game ended up getting cancelled. Literally the most anti-climatic ending to a game occurred. At this point I was filled with disappointment knowing one of the greatest moments of my life had been cut short.

I had experienced happiness, sadness, grief and nervousness all within the matter of about an hour and a half. And all that I could think of was that I couldn’t wait to do it all again next Friday.