In the Game

If you asked me at any given moment how I feel about sports, I would laugh at you. So would anyone else who knows me. Kir and sports do not even exist in the same world. I may have thought I had some athletic talent when I was in elementary school, but after getting picked dead last seventeen consecutive times during PE (the sport doesn't matter), I knew. Somehow I knew. And that is probably when I began to dislike sports. Over the years, as my clumsiness grew exponentially, my dislike intensified.
This seems to be a human trait, I've noticed: it's easier to loathe the our weaknesses than admit to them. You can supply your own examples here. You know what I'm talking about. You've seen it too.
And the cool thing about my life is that I was smart enough to marry a guy who likes sports about as much as I do. Now, he's not gifted with enormous feet and depth perception issues like I am; he just thinks sports are boring. He can't sit still long enough to watch a whole game.
And our kids, while they've dabbled in soccer and track and volleyball, really aren't athletes either in the true, diehard sense that some kids are. Seems to me like they can take or leave sports. Which is fine with me. I go to their games and I cheer for them. I have a pretty general idea of the game, but if you sit next to me, please don't ask me what any of the calls and hand signals mean. Especially in soccer. And even though I don't have any interest in the game, I love my kids and I LOVE watching them perform.
Okay, so I do have a point here, and it is this: today I finally (after six years of teaching) attended a game to watch my students play. Yeah, it's horrible I know. They know I hate sports, and they have kinda stopped asking me to come. Probably because I told them I'd rather gnaw my arm off than go to a sporting event that doesn't feature one of my children. But I felt wild and crazy tonight (and Jonah and Lauren seemed interested in joining me: Jonah for the game, Lauren for the guys), so the three of us went.
And you know what? I CAN'T BELIEVE I'M SAYING THIS!!! It wasn't that bad. Really. NOT. THAT. BAD. I feel like a mother sometimes anyway, a mother with--like 150 kids. And as I sat there watching my boys play basketball, I felt this upswell of pride in them. A different sort of pride than the feeling I have in the classroom when I help them with schoolwork. I saw a new side of them tonight, and it added a depth to my understanding of what is important to them. Now I just regret that it took me six years to figure it out.
Go Pirates. (And thanks, Grant, for asking me one more time.)