Basketball Jones
You could have knocked me over with the proverbial feather when my youngest daughter announced she was going to try out for the middle school basketball team. I have two daughters, ages 12 and 17, and neither one has ever played a sport. The aspiring basketball player is 12 and not particularly coordinated. She’s left handed and a little bit klutzy. Still, you have to admire her courage in attempting something never done before in our family, something that perhaps has been discouraged by me, her own mother.
Like most parents, I could say that my daughter’s interests are a reflection of their own desires and skills and of course, that is partially true. But let’s be honest here—our kids usually participate in the activities that we want them to. My daughter didn’t try out for a play at the age of 3 on her own volition. T-ball playing 4-year olds don’t just wake up one morning and drive the mini-van to the playing field. Parents expose their children to activities they themselves have an interest in. I know parents who deny they ever pushed their kids into sports, or dance or whatever…but they are lying.
My children’s extracurricular activities are almost exclusively performing arts related. Since a very young age, they have acted, danced and sang, played flutes and trumpets and clarinets and pianos…as my older daughter proudly says, she is both a band dork AND a theatre geek.
Well, anyway, so this kid wanted to break the mold a bit and try out for basketball. This was okay by me, as I knew she would never actually make the team or anything. Her stepfather and I threw ourselves into full-on supportiveness, contributing in the ways we know best, him by practicing free throws with her, and me by shopping for the best court shoes. We supported her 100% in her hoops quest, knowing full well we’d never have to watch a single game from the bleachers.
You know where this is going, right? That’s right, she made the team. And all of a sudden, our lives were turned upside down. In addition to the voice lessons, early morning jazz band practice, dance classes, play rehearsals and a semi-lucrative professional career as a model/actress, Olivia was also fitting in four days a week of basketball practice, plus games.
Olivia’s sister Ivy was appalled. One of Ivy’s strongly held beliefs is that the words “jock” and “evil” are synonymous. If she didn’t play in her school’s pep band, I think she would have gone her entire high school career without attending a single sporting event. In the spirit of sisterhood, she came to several of Olivia’s games, but stuck her nose in a copy of Les Miserables through most of the action, just to be a butthead.
I attended every home game and tried to get over my biases against organized sports. I found myself getting extremely anxious during the games. Accustomed to watching my daughters perform in front of hundreds of people with barely a blip in my pulse, I could not handle the stress of watching Olivia and her teammates pass the ball back and forth before several dozen parents. The fact that this particular team was stunningly bad helped a little. Most of the spectators (including me) cheered wildly any time any player on any team didn’t screw up. So that part was good—an encouraging atmosphere to all players…I liked that. It reminded me of Ivy and Olivia’s theatre experiences. In fact, I kept getting the whole thing confused with the theatre. Olivia was continually correcting my terminology, rolling her eyes when I said the team had cute “costumes”; reminding me that they had a coach, not a “director”. There was a lot to keep track of. I learned that in basketball there isn’t an “intermission”, but they do have time-outs. Also, apparently it is NOT good luck to tell an athlete to “break a leg”. Oh well, some things you learn the hard way.
Eventually I got the whole language thing sorted out, and Olivia’s team even ended up with a winning season. She hopes to be on the team again this year so I am busily rehearsing my lines, preparing for my role as a supporting member in the ensemble of sporting life. Hopefully I’ll get cast!
