I'll have you know that I DO know my way around a gym.
And I may have given some of you the wrong impression over the years about exercising.
It's true that I am quite lax in that department.
It's also true that now and then, I get on an exercise kick that lasts about three days.
But it's also true that I used to play sports.
I loved them.
I even followed all the wretched 'professional' Detroit teams in our state. Especially the Tigers.
My brother and I knew all the batting averages of our favorite players and ERA's of the pitchers.
If you don't know what ERA means....well...you'll have to Google it.
I'm not bitter about the fact that I followed the Tigers every year while they battled it out with Cleveland for last place in their division but two years after I got married and moved too far away to listen to any of the games on the radio, they won the stinkin' World Series.
Well anyway....I had to quit playing sports.
You know why?
Because I'm too competitive.
It's a curse.
If you are a teen and playing with the youth group, you can be competitive. Why? Because there are lots of boys and they are competitive too. And I didn't mind ticking off the boys if I stole the ball from them. But the girls? They take it personally.
I like having friends.
Girl friends don't steal the ball from each other.
So I don't play sports.
The last time I played anything was hockey.
It was my first time playing hockey and it was at a winter camp where I was supposed to be a chaperone.
We divided the teams into Canadians vs. Americans.
Bad idea.
Very bad idea.
Anyone who knows me knows that I am a big ol' American nerd.
I wear red,white and blue on the 4th.
I dress my kids the same.
I am deeply patriotic and it's so perfect that God's choice for our first born's birthday was the 4th of July.
So anyway....
Our team was losing. It was to be expected.
The Canadian team actually wore hockey skates.
The American team didn't even know white, female hockey skates existed.
We wore figure skates.
And we didn't have much of a clue how to play hockey.
Just get the puck. Put it in the net.
And we had seen a few hockey highlights on the news to know that you could 'check' people into the boards.
And we all knew the "Miracle on Ice" story of the American Olympic team. This was our big chance to beat the Canadians at their own sport and create our own little miracle right there at camp Barakel.
{Delusions of grandeur are no stranger to me, apparently.}
Well...we had no boards at this location but we did have snowdrifts along the edges of the rink.
I wanted the puck.
It was in front of a girl. I was behind her.
I wanted the puck.
I am sad to say that all reason completely left me and I pushed her into the snow bank.
I got the puck.
I put it in the net.
I also put myself into the net. But no one said I had to do it gracefully.
The girl was not happy with me for pushing her face into the snow.
I was not very happy with myself for being so mean.
But I knew if the opportunity presented itself, I would do it again.
So I don't play sports anymore.
Because I can't seem to control myself.
I play with my kids now and that is okay because I have no need to win.
It's the need to win that seems to be the problem for me.
Sigh....
