The Selfish Cry for Blood

This pallid sky mocks us. Even the greenest grass loses its hues, casting instead the image of instability, a modernist painting brushed by an artist lacking too many colors. Every shade of gray is accounted for above; you couldn’t paint it, nor would you want to. Too soon, too soon. Or, perhaps, an exercise in Seasonal Affective Disorder, practice for the next half-dozen months.

I sit away from the other parents, none of whom are challenged by the gloom. They are a mass of cavemen cheering savagely at their girls. Their yelling overlaps, a muddy mixture of encouragement more for their own behalf than that of their offspring. If only Ralph Steadman were here to capture this in ink. He would draw them without sympathy, some gnawing on the bloody bones of a mastodon, others standing and hurling red-faced pressure onto the field. A grandfather calls his charge’s name in every other word. “C’mon Betty, get to the ball Betty, that’s it Betty, get to the middle Betty.” Her name has been changed to protect her innocence; she’s got enough pressure to handle without appearing in these words of impractical voodoo.

He yells something about an opponent being slow, capable of being exploited on a breakaway. My heart breaks for the slow child who must hear his words; his voice has that peculiar timbre that cuts through any noise. I hope she isn’t comprehending his words are about her. Were it my kid, I would have said something.

My kid is slow too. She is not an athlete, at least not yet. Maybe she’ll grow into it, into something she likes. Or maybe she’ll sit down at a piano or pick up an alto sax and be able to speak through that. I find more satisfaction is creating a piece of music than I ever did hitting a 20 foot jumper from the corner.

Consider again these animals who guide their children with vague directions. Imagine if these creatures acted the same at their children’s band concert. Would this grandfather with the diamond-edged voice point out the flaws of the first chair trombonist if it meant moving his grandkid up a notch? “He’s got short arms, Betty. He can’t hit the high notes clearly, Betty. Hey Betty, her embouchure is sloppy, Betty.” What kind of world would that be?

And of course that world exists, but thankfully not in my circles. Competition is healthy, but hostile competition, wrongly guided competition, creates self-important jerks. It creates poor losers and even worse winners. It creates Republicans. Ye gods!

I’m glad my daughter has a different coach this year. The guy last year was a nice enough guy off the field, but during games he was only an assault charge away from being Woody Hayes. My kid doesn’t need that kind of pressure. She’s got enough to deal with without that jackass getting in her ear. But he’s not coaching her this year, and instead she’s got a really good guy fronting the team. He plays her regularly, knowing she won’t get better if she doesn’t play. He offers positive encouragement rather than angry shouts of guttural syllables that only served to make the animals on the sideline raise their passionate fists into the air and chant, “ugh ugh ugh ugh” in support.

This is exactly how the Tea Party started.

When she came anywhere near me, near enough that I didn’t have to over-extend my diaphragm to be heard, I calmly offered advice. “Stay with ‘em, girl. Move around, give her a target. You’re doing great, darlin’. Keep it up.” She would look at me and smile and twirl her hair and scratch her ear, ignoring the ball behind her. That’s my kid. I couldn’t be more proud.

As she sat on the sidelines, I considered what direction she might go in athletics. She could be a good golfer. Archery might be her thing. Watching her sitting on the blanket next to a teammate, suddenly throwing her arms around the other girl for a big hug for no reason that I could discern, I considered her as a cheerleader. She’s definitely supportive. Anyone who was there to witness it will never forget how she cheered the opposing team during a game of t-ball last year. So sure, a cheerleader. I feel good about this idea, though perhaps I won’t feel the same in another five years. I can see myself being a protective father. I remember the crushes I had on a couple of the cheerleaders when I played basketball. I also know I spent more time watching them than I did paying attention to the game, sometimes even when I was on the court. I will not be crazy about the idea of some hormonally-challenged boy ogling my daughter. Not when she’s fifteen, not when she’s fifty. Breathe. Breathe. Okay.

Children involved in athletics, if they are any good, at some point turn against their inferior teammates. They stop passing the ball, or they group together outside of practices and games and shun the less-talented. Yes, this is a generalization, but it happens more than any good parent wants to admit. I fear this for my kid. She’s sensitive to how she’s treated, and if such a thing were to happen to her, she’d be crushed. Admittedly, she needs to toughen up a bit. She knows it too. I have confidence that will happen at some point, but hopefully it happens before it’s too late. I hope, at some point, she’ll see what she is capable of and what is beyond her abilities, and make some hard choices. I was a decent-enough ball player in grade school, but I knew when I got to high school that I couldn’t and didn’t want to compete at that level. I hated stepping away from it, but to attempt to continue would have resulted in nothing good. And besides, those cheerleaders were way out of my league.

Her mother doesn’t value the importance of the arts. If my daughter shows some talent as a musician or an actor, her mother will struggle. I question her ability to be supportive, which for an artist is integral. It is up to me to suggest these alternate routes of growth and fellowship. I’d certainly rather hang out with a bunch of artists than with a bunch of athletes. I would rather my mind be strong than brag about how much I could bench. I would rather have dinner parties with copious amounts of wine than sit in a sauna for three hours trying to make weight. I would rather curl up with a good book than ride a bus for three hours only to run around in the freezing rain and get shoved around by a bunch of pituitary cases. But that’s me. My kid can do whatever she wants, and I’ll be there to support her. She’ll never hear me calling for blood, but she’ll hear me saying, “Good job, girl,” through my blue, shivering lips. And that’s enough for both of us.