by Anna Bauman

Before coming to St. Teresa’s, I had always desperately wanted to have a sister. I imagined how great it would be to braid each others’ hair and practice doing makeup, share secrets and talk about boys, wear each others’ clothes and be best friends.

Coming to STA, I often heard about this concept of “sisterhood,” whether it was splashed across the front of some recruitment magazine or talked of by older girls as if it was some secret society, coveted and mysterious.

In my first years at STA, I’ll admit, I was a bit skeptical. Of course I longed to be a part of this sisterhood, but no matter how hard I tried, it was an ever elusive idea that I just couldn’t grasp. I thought it must be a myth, a trigger word the school used to recruit students to come to an all-girls school.

I realize now that understanding the sisterhood is not something that happens overnight. It is not something that occurs at one moment in time. While I was expecting a light bulb to go off suddenly, what I was experiencing was the gradual accumulation of days and months and years worth of memories that evolved into my own definition of the sisterhood.

If you are like me, maybe you’re still a bit skeptical about sisterhood. But it is my prayer that you will find it in the simple, day to day happenings of the beautiful community around you.

Maybe you’ll see it when your friend makes a silly face at you in the halls, or when someone screams your name across the bustling quad during passing period.

Maybe you’ll feel it when you’re cramming for a test with classmates, or commiserating with the same girls when you “just know you failed,” but you feel better because you know they’ve got your back.

Or when you realize that each of your classes forms its own little family, and the girls who sit next to you in class understand you better than anyone else.

Maybe you’ll see it in the exchange of a knowing look of exasperation between you and the girl who had to park across the street when it’s just one of those mornings.

Or when you’re shamelessly stuffing your face with mashed potatoes and pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving, surrounded by the girls you sit next to in advisory everyday.

I hope you’ll feel it as you’re doubled over with laughter during the teacher skit when your teachers do and say things you thought they never would.

Or when your teacher asks how you’re doing, and you know they’re asking because they truly care.

Maybe you’ll hear it when the choir sings it’s hauntingly beautiful rendition of the alma mater.

Or when a group of girls randomly breaks into a proud chant of the same song amidst the confused glares of everyone else around you.

You might see it in the crowd at a packed Sion game, as you scream “WHAT DO WE EAT?” at the top of your lungs, dressed in some ridiculous-looking get-up, but knowing that no one will judge you because they look just as ridiculous.

Maybe you’ll hear it in the voices of hundreds of girls screaming “Party at STA” at every school dance, and you realize that it really is.

I know you’ll experience it when the school comes together in prayer and love in the face of pain and tragedy.

You might feel it when you finally slip your class ring onto your finger, and don’t ever take it off for the next year because you know it connects you in a special way to a network of amazing women of all ages across the whole world.

Maybe you’ll feel it when it’s finally your turn to explore the infamous M&A tunnel, and leave your mark next to the names of all those who have come before you.

I hope you feel it on your last day of school as you look down at the colorful scribbled notes on your old, yellowish polo, and know there are 141 girls who love you like a sister.

I know I did.

Sisterhood is experienced differently by everyone, but there is no denying that it is very real. Sisterhood is an all-encompassing word to describe the love and support that can be found in the hallowed halls of STA.

Class of 2015, thank you. Thank you for all the laughs, all the tears, all the memories, all the love.

If I could, I would tell my younger self that one day her wish would come true. But it would be greater than she ever could have imagined. Instead of one sister, she got 598.