We Like Sports and We Don't Care Who Knows

In high school, I played four sports. I didn't really excel at any of them, but since Central Lyon was a pretty small school, and my class wasn't particularly athletic, I played a role on the varsity cross country, basketball, track, and baseball teams. After graduating from high school, my inclination toward participating in sporting events began to dwindle. Yes, there was pick-up basketball at Bethel, and there was certainly Slayer, two-time intramural co-ed softball championship winner, but other things began to take precedence over running around on the court or smackin' the ball around on the field. After college, I almost never played anything. There were a few games of basketball here and there, and in Seoul I would attend an occasional open gym at SFS, but by and large I shied away from the rigors of the court and the field.

Last Wednesday, like every Wednesday, my baseball club met. The club is a bunch of sixth through tenth graders, some of whom seem to love playing and come dressed for the occasion, and some of whom wear pink and yellow and spend most of the time laughing and are only there because their friends are there (but their friends wear pink and yellow and spend most of their time laughing, too...). And a bunch of kids in between. It's pretty chaotic, and I have to yell the entire time, and no one listens very well.

However, this past week, I had an awesome time playing, though I can't speak for anyone else, and I was again reminded of how every sporting activity since high school has been for me. The formula is this: I am doing something, and a friend extends an invitation to play basketball or volleyball or softball, and I reluctantly agree, but I immediately lose energy and pizazz and go into the athletic match unexcited about getting sweaty and frustrated during the competition. Then we play, and whether I do well (rare) or not (common), I walk away with the endorphins flowing freely through my veins. I feel good afterward and am glad I went, glad I had the experience playing.

So too it is on Wednesdays. I don't look forward to getting these students into lines to play catch or try to explain how to swing the bat while half of them aren't listening or telling those guys over there to get their fingers out of their noses and start moving. I don't know how to coach baseball or teach baseball to a group that wants to listen, much less thirty kids with varying levels of English and baseball desire. But each week - and especially last week - I walk away feeling accomplished, like we've had a good time.

Last week I had Mr. Wang take half the ruffians onto one side of the soccer field and play catch and 500, which he said they enjoyed. The other half took batting practice, with me pitching. And it was super fun. Everyone made contact, at least. There were some skinny, awkward little kids that knocked the cover off the ball. One of the seventh grade girls hit every single pitch I threw, and she hit them hard. This one emo-lookin' dude who has the "too cool" attitude tattooed all over himself nearly killed his older, stronger peers with his line drives. I almost got destroyed by a single up the middle. Kids were talkin' smack. I was talkin' smack. It was on. The crowning moment was when this young guy from Japan came up. We'd talked earlier; he was new at school and I never saw him hanging out with anyone, but we'd discussed baseball a while, which was a passion of his. He hit a couple hard ground balls that no one could handle, and then he parked one way, way, way over the fence of the other side of the soccer field. So good.

Then we left, and the mayhem was over. I was sweaty and sort of hoarse and had a bunch of that black rubber stuff from the fake turf all over me, but there was that feeling again. The love of the game, the satisfying fatigue of having gone out and played. Perhaps part of my joy was having reached 3:50 yet again, but another part of me looks forward to next Wednesday, when we play again.