I played dodgeball with my roommate last night; I was merely a fill-in for a game or two because they had a double-header. Just a few observations first:
1. Dodgeball is vastly underrated as a sport. It combines agility, strategy and strength all the while giving one the opportunity to throw an orb-like object at someone's face as HARD AS ONE CAN. Awesome.
2. Dodgeball spawns its share of hacks, and that was made infinitely clear last night. The 'commissioner' of the league wore a t-shirt with matching headband and he was fierce. You just knew from first glance that he was the kid that everyone picked on in high school. Now he's getting his revenge, dodgeball style. Good for him.
3. Girl in knee-highs and a sports bra nimbly jumping out of the ball's way = pretty hot.
3a. Girl in stirrup pants and over-sized tee squatting to duck from a ball and getting nailed in the face = pretty gross, but funny as hell.
4. I don't care how hard you hit someone or how pumped you are after catching another player's ball and thus eliminating him...under NO CIRCUMSTANCES are you to yell and point at the other team. This is dodgeball, not ultimate fighting or the NFL. I even saw some McEnroe-esque arguing with refs last night. Unacceptable.
I had intended on a brighter light to this story, so I digress. The first game I played in, I was told that the first guy we had to eliminate was this kid wearing a Portis jersey. Seemed simple enough, and he looked like an easy target. However, after several futile attempts and watching him take out my entire team, it came down to just me vs. his team. Naturally he had the go-ahead from his team to take aim first. And sure as shit, this first missile caught me in the leg and I was out. I started to question it and he approached me to demonstrate how it had glanced off of my leg before I had a chance to deflect it with the ball I was holding. He was right.
After a closer look at the subject in said Portis jersey, I realized that I knew him. I went to high school with him, co-existed with him and his group of friends but we never had the same interests. I was a three-sport athlete, he chose dark basements, hard drugs and patchouli...all of this by the age of 14. This kid, whom I'll call F, overdosed several times and flirted with death well before our 17th birthdays. He lost a few cohorts along the way, one of them being one of those rare links between social groups who everyone loves; this particular friend of his was also one of my best friends.
I hadn't seen F since graduation day of high school. There were many times where I was sure he was dead, or at least in rehab somewhere. The rehab part turned out to be true, but that was quite a while back. So after we caught up a bit, turns out F has been clean for 9 years...NINE YEARS. He plays dodgeball year round, makes a good, honest living as a craftsman and generally enjoys life. It was great to see him, and we promised to keep in touch and all that shit. I know we won't, but just knowing how far he's come and what he's made of his life is inspiring.
Don't worry, I'm not gonna get all 'let's make the world a better place' on you. But I'll be damned if I'm truly ever going to think my life sucks and is beyond repair. That's horseshit in most every case. Those cases that would fall under the 'beyond repair' category will be discussed at a later date.
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