...you will not win.
We've all received that email about the mother of the bride who buys a great dress for the wedding, only to find out the father of the bride's new (young) wife has the same dress and intends to wear it. So the MOTB wears it to the rehearsal dinner. The moral being "don't mess with women," but if you think about it, it's more about "don't mess with experienced women."
That would be me. The 53-year-old mother of a nine-year old.
She plays a couple of club sports, besides the school activities. Basketball season is winding up, and for two of the last three weekends we've been in play-offs. In the regular season play-offs, we played a team that was VIOLENT. The refs "spoke to" the team twice, and they had three girls foul out. THREE. Fifth graders. (Keeping in mind my kid is a 4th grader, playing up? She ain't the biggest apple on the tree.) At one point during the game, #23 (a tall, elegant child) turned and looked into our stands and mouthed, "F**k you." After the game, where we had parents from OTHER teams yelling for our team and specifically...for #23 to get OFF my kid...we left bruised, sore and victorious. With a BIG ol' trophy. (One of our parents was on the phone to the director before the game was over, and #23 was punished IN PRACTICE. She ran laps for an hour. And, according to her coach, showed no remorse. Bigger problems than basketball there.)
Then, this weekend was the Final Four. And Saturday, we were playing The Mean Team From Hell again. It's been two weeks and my kid still has shadows of the bruises.
And The Mama was prepared.
I still have (took me three hours to find it, but I did) the original 8mm video camera from when The Nice Kid was born nearly 15 years ago. It is NOT palm-sized. I took it and a full-sized tripod, and off we marched to watch The Not Nice Kid's team take on TMTFH, in the semi-finals. We were ready.
The camera set up nicely on a lower tier of the bleachers. I popped out the screen, and maneuvered up and down the court, following the play. Did a decent job of keeping my mouth shut. But later in the game, I had moved down to talk to a friend and #23 got cocky again. And I yelled at someone sitting by my camera, "Make sure you keep that camera on #23!" One of our team siblings did, zooming in and out and tracking ALL the action.
I missed a lot of the mouthing off between the parents, and my kid hit the floor and came up crying more than once. She is her father and grandfather's child...they are born this way. Me? You want this ball? Here, I'll give it to you. No WAY am I getting competitive about no BALL. (The Nice Kid, on the other hand, plays a lot of sports with great ability and no drive...she's mainly checking out how she looks in that little skirt and are we going to LaHacienda to eat after the game? ;)
We won. Got great t-shirts about Final Four something, and went to LaHa to celebrate. Then Sunday? When we walked into the gym for the final game? Turns out, The Director has received some emails about someone videoing the game the day before. Complaining emails. About parents taping things, and that's not right, and various and sundry other complaints about the treatment of their UNBRUISED children. (I jerked my kid off a soccer field once for spreading her hands and going, "What?" to the ref. Anyone argues with the ref? It's gonna be the coach. You play and keep your mouth shut.)
Still did a good job of keeping my mouth shut. Wondered why, if your child's not doing anything wrong? What difference does it make if someone tapes the game? But, as I explained to The Director after we won the Championship...
That camera hasn't worked for five years. And I don't use that tripod because it's so big and bulky.
It's all in the presentation ;)
We've all received that email about the mother of the bride who buys a great dress for the wedding, only to find out the father of the bride's new (young) wife has the same dress and intends to wear it. So the MOTB wears it to the rehearsal dinner. The moral being "don't mess with women," but if you think about it, it's more about "don't mess with experienced women."
That would be me. The 53-year-old mother of a nine-year old.
She plays a couple of club sports, besides the school activities. Basketball season is winding up, and for two of the last three weekends we've been in play-offs. In the regular season play-offs, we played a team that was VIOLENT. The refs "spoke to" the team twice, and they had three girls foul out. THREE. Fifth graders. (Keeping in mind my kid is a 4th grader, playing up? She ain't the biggest apple on the tree.) At one point during the game, #23 (a tall, elegant child) turned and looked into our stands and mouthed, "F**k you." After the game, where we had parents from OTHER teams yelling for our team and specifically...for #23 to get OFF my kid...we left bruised, sore and victorious. With a BIG ol' trophy. (One of our parents was on the phone to the director before the game was over, and #23 was punished IN PRACTICE. She ran laps for an hour. And, according to her coach, showed no remorse. Bigger problems than basketball there.)
Then, this weekend was the Final Four. And Saturday, we were playing The Mean Team From Hell again. It's been two weeks and my kid still has shadows of the bruises.
And The Mama was prepared.
I still have (took me three hours to find it, but I did) the original 8mm video camera from when The Nice Kid was born nearly 15 years ago. It is NOT palm-sized. I took it and a full-sized tripod, and off we marched to watch The Not Nice Kid's team take on TMTFH, in the semi-finals. We were ready.
The camera set up nicely on a lower tier of the bleachers. I popped out the screen, and maneuvered up and down the court, following the play. Did a decent job of keeping my mouth shut. But later in the game, I had moved down to talk to a friend and #23 got cocky again. And I yelled at someone sitting by my camera, "Make sure you keep that camera on #23!" One of our team siblings did, zooming in and out and tracking ALL the action.
I missed a lot of the mouthing off between the parents, and my kid hit the floor and came up crying more than once. She is her father and grandfather's child...they are born this way. Me? You want this ball? Here, I'll give it to you. No WAY am I getting competitive about no BALL. (The Nice Kid, on the other hand, plays a lot of sports with great ability and no drive...she's mainly checking out how she looks in that little skirt and are we going to LaHacienda to eat after the game? ;)
We won. Got great t-shirts about Final Four something, and went to LaHa to celebrate. Then Sunday? When we walked into the gym for the final game? Turns out, The Director has received some emails about someone videoing the game the day before. Complaining emails. About parents taping things, and that's not right, and various and sundry other complaints about the treatment of their UNBRUISED children. (I jerked my kid off a soccer field once for spreading her hands and going, "What?" to the ref. Anyone argues with the ref? It's gonna be the coach. You play and keep your mouth shut.)
Still did a good job of keeping my mouth shut. Wondered why, if your child's not doing anything wrong? What difference does it make if someone tapes the game? But, as I explained to The Director after we won the Championship...
That camera hasn't worked for five years. And I don't use that tripod because it's so big and bulky.
It's all in the presentation ;)
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BRAVO!