Lacrosse the Nations is excited to share Clair Cadmus’s write up from their LtN event. This entry certainly doesn’t need much of an introduction as she did a beautiful job highlighting the importance of the event herself. We are extremely grateful for Notre Dame Academy’s efforts and their true understanding of the meaning behind their event!

“I’ve never imagined myself living in a landfill. I’ve never thought about what it would be like to climb over mounds of trash everyday just to get to school. I can’t even picture

myself living this lifestyle. But for the people of the La Chureca community these kinds of conditions are what they experience every day. When I first heard about this community and their struggles to achieve a normal life I just couldn’t believe that this was actually real, that this community lived their lives like this.

Then one day while at practice my coach announced that my lacrosse team was going to sponsor the people of La Chureca and that we were going to host a fundraising game for them to raise as much money as we could to improves their lives and their community. After hearing this I became overjoyed and couldn’t wait to help them.  I rushed home from practice and checked out the Lacrosse the Nations website. I soon fell in love with the organization and couldn’t wait to raise money for this community.

As the game approached my fellow players and I became more and more excited to participate in this event and do all that we could to help the people of La Chureca. We received our orange shoelaces three days before our scheduled fundraising game and as soon as we could every single one of us was taking out our old laces and we were replacing them with our new orange ones. After getting our laces in it seemed like we were all united, that little things like having the same shoelaces really brought us together.

The day of the game finally arrived and the weather wasn’t really cooperating with us. It was almost 90 degrees with what seemed like 100% humidity, not really the ideal conditions for a lacrosse game. Despite the weather we were all very eager to begin our highly anticipated game. Most donors agreed to donate a certain amount of money for each goal we scored while others decided to just donate a certain amount. During the game we scored seven goals, after every goal I can guarantee you that each and every one of us was wearing a smile, knowing that we were helping the people of La Chureca.

The score of the game didn’t mean a single thing to any of us, it didn’t matter if we won or if we lost we were still giving to a great cause and having fun doing it. My Lacrosse the Nations experience has honestly changed my life. It has opened my eyes to the importance of giving to others, not just to the people in my area but giving to people all over the world. It has helped me realize that little things, like hosting a fundraising game and wearing orange shoelaces, can really impact the lives of others. Not only has my Lacrosse the Nations experience changed my life I believe it has changed the lives of all my fellow team mates. Our experience together has united us not only as a team but as a family. Because of Lacrosse the Nations I believe we all learned a little about ourselves and each other, it’s not all about the competition it’s about giving to others and having fun doing it.

Lacrosse the Nations Captain

Clair Cadmus

Notre Dame Academy

Toledo, OH