Ole Ole Ole

As the World Cup approaches and our excitement grows, I am reminded of my history in soccer. I grew up playing soccer. Admittedly, I was never very good. I was always looking for ways to get out of running and I rode the bench with a mastered skill. I am lacking in competitive spirit. I always enjoyed friendships with my fellow teammates more than going to practice. I am glad, though, that I played so long because is was good for me and I like saying I used to play soccer; then people can think I was a super-star athlete and I am not about to correct their thinking. I will undoubtedly sign my kids up to play as soon as they are old enough.

Here is a small catalog of some of my soccer disasters:

Once, in high school, while we were driving to soccer practice, a few of my teammates and I decided we didn't want to go that day, so we turned our car around and went somewhere else (I can't remember where now, probably to eat something). Since people had seen us in route to practice, driving all together, panic quickly spread around and it was assumed that something terrible had happened to us. When we turned up unharmed and sheepish, we were chastised and suspended for a handful of games. We were all starters too, which made it even more annoying to the team. Oops. I think it was my brilliant plan too.

Another time, while playing on a travel soccer team, as a defender, I managed to score on my own goalie, twice. It was quite amazing. I don't know what the heck my coach was doing leaving me in there so long. The other team must have loved it.

From time to time, my dad used to make us be linesmen at local soccer games, since he was in charge of assigning refs to all the games. I was not very good at it since I would forget which way to point the flag and sometimes lose focus and miss calls completely. I remember in one specific game (I am ashamed even as I type this), I thought that I had never really called an Offsides call in a game, so impulsively I raised my flag up at an arbitrary time. Immediately the coach for the offending (or not really offending at all) team started yelling at the ref (who happened to be my dad) that I was wrong but the other team was clapping for me. My dad came over to confer with me, where I assured him I was right. Why did I do things like this you ask, I don't know, I often ask the same thing.

Once I decided I was going to quit my traveling team because I didn't want to go to practice; I wanted to hang out with my friends instead, but they convinced me to go to one last practice before I quit. So I went. And during conditioning, while I was loafing along instead of sprinting, my foot got caught in a tuft of grass and I slowly and clumsily fell to the ground. It turned out I had broken my ankle, though no one really believed me because I was so lazy, they thought I just didn't want to run anymore. They were mostly right.

I feel like Chunk from Goonies with all of these stories... (remember the scene where he was telling the Fratelli's about everything bad he had ever done?)

I feel like I should redeem myself with one good story. It took me some time to think of this: One time, my traveling team was really short on players and didn't have a goal keeper so somehow I got volunteered to go and play. After thinking I was going to crap my pants, I went in and it turned out I was actually pretty good, even though I couldn't catch the ball for anything. I could, however, run out and tackle the approaching players and grab the ball. What do you know? Turns out I am awesome after all. Then I got recruited by the women's national team where I went on to have a successful career until I retired so I could have babies and stay home to raise them. One part of this story may be inaccurate. I will let you decide which part that is.

So, I advise you to keep your kids in soccer, even if they complain and are kind of junky at playing anyway, because if nothing else, they will have some great stories later in life. And also imagine I am saying something wise about building character.