Hannahlaneblogs

Happy Columbus day! We have classes off and no practice today, so I’ve been having a slower moving more relaxing day which after a weekend of travel, was very much needed! Currently grinding out some calculus homework with Lizzie and sipping on a raspberry mocha iced coffee. 

It started getting cold in Western Mass, which sadly means it will continually get colder and stay cold until April. I love the fall, the foliage, sweater weather, and pumpkin flavored things. This is the “coldest” weather I thoroughly enjoy. I can tolerate the snow up until January and after New Years, I am ready for it to be summer again. Anyway, Lilly and I had our OIM lab and then went to Hamp for dinner because Monday is our FAVORITE dinner night- salmon night. Hamp disappointed us without salmon. Also, since it was colder we decided to stay in and stream Women in Business, so we could also get some work done. That night, we all went to Lizzie’s and watched part of the second episode of the Jeffrey Dahmar series on Netflix. I am a huge true crime fan, but this one is almost too much for me. That night, I had the strangest dream and haven’t watched the show again since. 

Tuesday was uneventful, just easing back into field hockey. Since I had COVID, I was only able to train at 50% to aid in returning smoothly and not over exert my lungs. 

On Wednesday morning I had my first OIM in person exam. Afterwards, Jack and I got coffee and I mostly just relaxed and got some things done before team counseling and practice. We did the sweetest activity during counseling where we had to write a few things that make us feel confident about ourselves and then fold that part of the paper over. Then we passed the papers around, you could only see the person’s name, and write something we admire about them or something they do that we would like to do more like them. It’s always easier to write nice things about someone else than yourself. This exercise made my day- it always feels nice to see what other people think positively about you. After practice, Natalie and I had a study session in the 19th floor common room. This has become another one of my new favorite study spots (I am here right now). Then, I had to finish my laundry and pack for Philadelphia and Yale.

Of course, I slept through my first five alarms on Thursday morning. It’s not that I’m not a morning person, I enjoy the mornings, I simply just am not good at waking up. Luckily, I got up at 8:30 and was able to be out of my building by 8:40 on my way to Boyden for our 9AM departure for Philly. I had such a solid plan for my morning routine- I was going to get up at 7:30 and get myself all together, grab a coffee from Starbucks on my way to the locker room, and clean some of my locker before we left. Our leave time got pushed back to 9:30, so Alexa and I were able to grab coffee at Roots, a cafe in the Honors College, before we left. The bus trip was about five and ½ hours. I spent most of the time sleeping, reading The Brothers Bulger, and listening to music. The time went by quicker than I had expected. Once we arrived in Philadelphia, we had a little less than an hour to decompress in the hotel and relax before practicing on Saint Joseph’s field. The A10 conference post season games were held here last season. For dinner, we returned to the restaurant we went to last year, The Couch Tomato. I had amazing gnocchi (shoutout Katy Skags for putting me onto gnocchi) and some garlic knots. 

The hotel continental breakfast ended up being very small with minimal options, so after eating the provided fruit and muffins, we were able to take the team cards to get a more substantial game day breakfast. Emma, Mali, Paula, and I tried Colombe Coffee where I had an iced coffee with vanilla and almond milk. It was a solid coffee, nothing special. We lost our 3pm game to Saint Joe’s 0-3, but we may see them again in conference play, which is being held at UMass this year. On Friday night, we had lots of time to relax and get work done. I was able to make lots of progress in The Brothers Bulger. 

On Saturday morning we were back on the road to New Haven for our Yale game on Sunday. Yale reminded me of the fact I still have yet to finish Gilmore Girls, despite watching it all the time last year. The bus ride was shorter than the original one to Philadelphia, but for some reason it felt longer. I think it was because I felt a little bit car sick. We went right to the field for practice and then had burgers for dinner that night. My OIM project work isn’t compatible with my Macbook, so I used the hotel computers to finish it. 

Sunday morning we took a treacherous walk basically along the highway for Starbucks. The things field hockey girls will do for their coffee. I tried my new favorite raspberry mocha, and didn’t love the way Starbucks made it. There was too much mocha and not enough ice. The next Starbucks drink I want to try is a brown sugar shaken espresso with pumpkin cream cold brew. We won our 1pm game against Yale 1-0 and then headed back to Amherst. The bus ride from New Haven to Amherst was only a little under two hours. 

Looking into this upcoming week, we don’t have any hockey travel which is nice and gives me more time to just clean everything and be organized. My room is currently a disaster from coming back and dropping all my clothes and everything everywhere. I also plan on going to bed around 10:30 every night this week, because I feel like I have been running on not enough sleep. The combination of staying up late and trying to get up early has been catching up with me a little bit. I also am going to make an effort to read before bed instead of being on my phone. Sometimes I just need to ground myself and realign my focus on being mindful about my self care. I will remind y’all to check in with yourselves and do the same! 

Xoxo,

Hannahlane