hardship

Today's soccer game was the absolute epitome of a rough game, but it was also a game we could have won.

I haven't really discussed soccer in a while, and part of that is just the general writing malaise, but part of it is the injustice of this season.  I've had a roster of ten at an age level at which they play eleven on a side.  My team has played a person down each game this season, and last week saw us playing two down.

I'm not going to write a post bitching about the unfairness of it all.  I don't know how the kids on the team feel about it, though they have to see the unfairness.  The thing is they don't seem affected by it.  They go out every week and give everything they have.  They take it and turn around and keep trying.  Even on the roughest day playing against a team with seven subs they didn't stop.  Even when one of my girls told me she just couldn't run anymore she turned around and kept going.

Today was especially rough.  We once again had nine players show, and the opposing team was nice enough to play only ten, so it was a little even.  It was still an all boys team versus my coed, and while I feel like that can't help but be a factor you wouldn't think it has any bearing when you see my two girls play.  Also, I don't want to suggest that my female players are any less capable than their male teammates or any of the boys they've played against this season.

I should mention here that I'm not the overly comptetive coach that some coaches are.  I do want to win, and I do want my team to win, but more than that I want them to learn the game and to fall in love with the game, to have fun.  If they've given everything they have to give then I'm satisfied, and I'm proud. 

I also make a point throughout the season starting with the very first practice to let them know my priorities regarding injuries.  My list of things I need them to know are true is that it is just a game, that they are always more important than the game and that their safety and health are more important than the game.

One of the girls entered the game with a minor hamstring issue.  I kept an eye on her and whenever I was able I asked her how she was doing.  She's tough and spent too much of the game fighting for the ball often against two opponents at once.  Another of my players also pulled his hamstring slightly while playing defense, then in the second half after being moved to goal keeper he stopped a shot that bent his hand too far back but didn't do any damage beyond hurting.

And then a defensive player went down and didn't get up.  As the players on the field took a knee I jogged across to check on him.  He stayed down for a few more moments and actually apologized for, "letting you down."  I could almost cry sitting here now thinking about it.  Of course I immediately let him know that he in no way let me down. 

He insisted that he could play as he got to his feet and took a tentative couple of steps.  He was wobbling and unable to put any weight on the knee but insisted he could play.  If I'd let him he would have tried and would have made the injury worse, so I had to tell him no.  Even then he tried to walk off the field by himself until he finally realized that he did need my shoulder just then.

My team got back into the game and, if anything, began to play even harder.  We'd entered the final quarter when I lost another player.

It was my girl with the hamstring pull, and this time I ran onto the field.  I knew immediately it was gonna be bad, and as I reached her I saw she was crying.  She'd hit the ground and was covered in grass.  The referee and I knelt next to her and took her hands.  We helped her to calm down and start breathing normally while her mom also arrived to help.

The game was over.  I couldn't ask any more of these guys at this point.  We were down enough goals that we couldn't come back, and this was just the last straw. 

We have a week off for fall break.  I think we could all really use the time off.  I told them that practice is sorta optional because of fall break but that I'd be there even if we only screw around and have fun rather than actually practice.  But then that's one of the beauties of soccer that even when you're just messing around you're somewhat practicing.

We might have lost on goals, but I and all the parents won by watching the heart and determination we saw in our kids.  I hope that my team got the win of having persevered in spite of the blows they took, that they learn to keep fighting no matter what.  And I want every single one that is eligible back on my team next season.

it belongs in the pool

During the US team's attempt to make their way through the World Cup I thought I might have developed a new appreciation for Landon Donovan, striker for both the US mens national team and MLS team LA Galaxy.

I should point out that I've hated him for years.  He has his moments, but so often his moments seem only to happen during those MLS games.  I should also admit that I don't watch nearly as many MLS games as I would if I had more t.v. in my life to enrich my moments, so I'm sure I've missed whatever the hell else people see in him.

I should also admit that I don't want to imagine my US team as unable to win more games because we just aren't that good.  I get that we don't have the history so much of the world has, and that lack of history means that we don't have the ingrown traditions of soccer.  Our kids, till recently, didn't really grow up playing soccer, though for whatever reasons it does seem to be growing more popular.

I wonder sometimes if it's growing more popular because so many kids that would love to play something don't play football or baseball for whatever reasons.  Perhaps the kids are finally realizing that football is kinda stupid, and baseball is soooo boooooring.  Or maybe in the fall the kids' mommies don't want them hurting themselves playing football, and baseball is soooooo boooooring.

Either way, it's growing, and as it does we'll begin to produce more of those players that would be good at any sport along with those kids that are only good at soccer or will only ever be good at soccer, and eventually we'll have a system that can overpay spoiled assholes to the point where the dual sport kid sees basketball as the sport to help him keep in shape for soccer while he awaits that lucrative pro deal.  Then we'll win the World Cup.

But watching part of the game tonight reminded me that I used to hate Landon Donovan, and now it's back.  Within twenty minutes of beginning to watch the game all the old animus rolled right back around.  And I should now admit that I didn't even watch the first half.  I only started watching somewhere in the vicinity of the fifty fifth minute.

I watched him dive twice and intentionally handle the ball once.  And the moral purist in me that loves the beauty of the beautiful game just hates seeing that shit.  Seriously?  Diving?  And this from the guy that's supposed to be our best hope? our best player?

A hand I can almost get.  At least then it's . . . NO!  Fuck that guy.  It's part of the game that you don't touch the fucking ball with your hand.  It's not even that it's against the rules so much as it's just fucking wrong, and fuck it being strategic and a good move, and there's nothing noble about taking the yellow to help your team.  It's just not how it goes.  I'd almost rather see a good dive.

But fuck a dive too!  I get when you're running full speed that sometimes it really doesn't take a hard blow to send  you spinning.  I get a hard shot that just totally knocks you stupid that really was a fair tackle but you got the foul because maybe you rolled a tiny bit more than inertia might have really caused.  And I don't even like those, because it's still kinda like a dive, and I hate diving.  The thing is, you got beat, and instead of just dealing you're going to try and get a foul called by pretending you didn't get beat?  Man up, motherfucker. 

Maybe I still just want too much to be valiant and pure of heart and actually earn my wins.  It's so infuriating to know that you didn't get beaten but lost to some bullshit.  And when it happens you just have to suck it up or be the sour grapes guy bitching about what he knows happened. 

Sometimes you get beat, and sometimes you beat yourselves, and sometimes you don't start fast enough and have to clean up your mess.  But that should never mean that you handle the ball and fake fouls.  Sometimes you just have to deal, to climb back on the horse, to pull yourself by your boot straps, to refuse to keep getting beaten.  And maybe sometimes you just don't get to do those things.  Sometimes you just aren't going to win, and sometimes the other team is going to be better.

But for fuck sake, we're Americans.  We wear the white hats and save the day.  We wipe the blood out of our eyes and rescue the maiden.  And we don't go for the nut punch unless we're actually fighting some sort of demon creature that eats babies.

we'll see bout this

a) I can give every single child the same chances, choices, options

b) I can put your kid where I want them and train them to do that job so that we can win games

There's been a lot of soccer in my life lately, and currently the t.v. behind me is showing what I'm assuming is this year's ACC women's championship between the Tarheels and the Seminoles.  I'm kind of assuming the game is being played in the spring. 

And I'm loving it!  This week I watched part of the men's version of the same ACC championship, UNC vs. UNV, and I watched the US women's national team tie at one with Sweden.  Earlier tonight I watched Manchester United beat Celtic three to nothing, and last night was MLS action, DC United versus Seattle Sounders with Seattle getting that win.

While the kids' soccer sign ups usually sneak up on me I got an email this time around to confirm whether I planned to coach at the U12 level again.  So it's been on my mind a bit.  You might even say that I've been thinking about it.

I may not have shared anything about last season, and I hate to have to say it, but we had an entirely losing season in the spring.  I had a great group of kids that I'd love to coach again, and I think that we could have a totally different season this time around, partly because they'd go in knowing each other.

That was one of my complaints, and it's a complaint I had with my U8's as well.  I was given teams of kids that didn't even know each other for the most part, though a couple kids did know each other, and there were a couple of pairs of kids that were friends with each other.  And I recognized larger groups of kids on other teams as having been those same large groups before. I feel that left my kids at a bit of a disadvantage going into the season, and due to that and other random nonsense toward the end of the season really messed with their heads.  They never got the chance to see themselves as the team that I saw, and I remain proud of what they were able to do.

But I'm not here to bitch about that.  I think that having heard from the coach coordinator is an attempt to address a problem that's been recognized by more people than me.

I do want a winning team, but more than that I recognize that these kids are ten and eleven years old.  My goal has always been to help them develop a love for and understanding of the game, to help them learn skills that will make them better players and to give them access to different positions.  I don't want for a kid to think he belongs in a position without his agreement. 

The key is to find the balance between a and b from the beginning of this literary journey.  I doubt I'll be coaching U8 as we're going to find something else for The Boy.  Soccer is so not his thing, and the only time he really wants to play is before the season actually starts.  Once he's out having to actually run and play soccer he changes his mind. 

And that's fine. 

I'm curious to attend the preseason coach meeting, to find what players I have from last season and to see them again at our first practice as well as to meet the new guys.  I'm excited to start working with them, to try this thing about balance where I push them to greatness.

And now for something sort of along the same lines and not entirely something different, and I get that it's a pipe dream, but I love the idea. Read on.

I may have another trick up my sleeve in addition to balancing the whole things I said, and it gets to my goals as a coach, and it gets to a concern I have always had with how I think I assume the parents see me as a coach.  I could totally be wrong about their opinions I assume for them.

See, we live in a football town.  I know already that, come fall, our soccer Saturdays will be a sea of orange in support of the local college team.  Some of the families only watch soccer when it's their kids, but they sure as hell are going to watch the sports they grew up with and know and understand.

They just don't get soccer . . . yet.  I'm going to attempt to give the families homework, though I'm not sure it will work.  I'm going to give them watching soccer homework, and I'm going to request that the parents and kids watch as many game as is reasonable for them, assuming we can still get some soccer on the t.v.  I want them to get it, to know what's happening, to understand why it's beautiful and why people love it.

I have a few weeks before I really have to worry about any of this, but those weeks are going to go by quickly while I'm not really paying attention because it seems so far away still.  And then suddenly it'll be time.  I'm excited.

neither here or where

Remember back when I would post links to interesting things and would sometimes provide comentary?  Yeah?  I barely do, but let's see if we can do it again.

The article HERE at the soccer blog No Short Corners is about nationalism and soccer.  Or is it about national identity and the fact that here in the Oh Ten nations are slowly beginning to look more and more like each other and even to act more and more like each other till eventually there isn't really that much that you can say makes the nations different?

Basically we are in the future.  In the past there may or may not have been actual differences in different nations/states.  I can see that, and I don't necessarily think we're necessarily past that point.  In the battle between nature and nurture I see both of them having their own place, and I see the place you're from having some effect as well.

I have to admit to having never been outside the US, and what discussion I've had with non Americans is very limited.  I did once ask a Scottish guy and and English guy who were in town for business about the drink we know as an Irish car bomb, and they said that they too have that drink, but they certainly don't refer to it as such.  I'm not sure if that's true.  Perhaps they were humoring the honky.

Either way the article is worth reading.

technology vs. human face

If you've watched any of the action in the currently occurring World Cup and if you also know anything about soccer then you've no doubt seen at least one missed call by a referee. If you haven't seen a bad call then you haven't been watching.

I'll accept that my US team didn't play nearly as well as Ghana in the game we lost that sent us home. The US couldn't hold onto a ball, couldn't seem to get on the end of passes, and looked frightened at the speed with which Ghana ran at whoever had the ball. I saw what looked like a lot of panicking and getting rid of the ball with far too many passes going to a man in red as opposed to a teammate.

It's arguable that the US was tired, having only two days between games, though Ghana only had half a day more of rest than did the US. It's also worth noting that in each of the previous three games the US played our guys were cheated out of a goal and possibly the win. Why does this matter?

In soccer the team that scores first certainly puts themselves at an advantage. In a sense all you need to do is keep the ball for your side the rest of the game while your opponents need not only to score to tie the game but score a second time to get the win.

So given that that the US had pivotal goals disallowed they found themselves having to work that much harder than they should have. They had an uphill battle over and over that they should not have faced, and it's worth noting because this tiredness from having to work harder than they should have certainly set them up for a rough game against Ghana.

I hope none of this seems like sour grapes because it's also worth noting that our guys gave up an early goal in each game and set themselves up for the uphill battle. Couple that with FIFA hiring degenerates to ref games and the fact that the assistant refs apparently just don't know their job, and you get a recipe that cooks up a big pot of US out in the first stage of the knock out round.

And having all this to ruminate, I still think that there's no room for replays in soccer. I don't want to see the game ruined by constantly stopping to check a ref's call. I don't want my beloved soccer to turn into Americanized crap in which the sponsors rule the field by stopping the game for commercials every few minutes. I love soccer because a ninety minute game takes slightly more than ninety minutes versus American football in which a sixty minute time clock takes between two and three hours to actually tick all the way to zero.

One of my greatest fears regarding replays in soccer is the insidious nature of advertising. All it takes is fifteen seconds to cut away for a quick reminder that Buick sells cars or that Coca Cola may be a refreshing beverage. And once you allow that first little ad to sneak in you've set yourself up for soccer played in quarters because some dink thinks you should be reminded about how easy it is to gamble on Ameritrade and has the money to convince the powers that be that they too could line their pockets if only.

And for the record I also hate that American football players sometimes don't even play the last few minutes versus soccer teams who are losing and know that they can't overcome the goal deficit yet continue to fight till the very last blast of the whistle.

soccer and pride in one day?

Tomorrow I work at nine in the morning and hope to be off in time to watch the US continue their climb to World Cup victory. They play Ghana, the team that sent us home four years ago, and I hope to see our guys send them home this year.

Following work, as I assume I won't actually be off till after the game, I'm going to change into the jeans people have told my I look good in and a shirt that is clean, and then I'm going into the heat of the square for our town's gay pride event.

And then I don't know what to expect. I neglected to take the day off the past two years and have only seen pride from afar or when passing through on a smoke break. I asked specifically to work a day shift this year. I don't want to lose any hours, but I do want to enjoy being surrounded by gay people. That doesn't happen nearly often enough, especially lately as I've not been to any of our town's gay bars in several months.

Thinking about it now I may have avoided the gay bars this entire year up to now.

While I often get somewhat drunk at whatever bar I go to, the gay bars are nearly always worse. Not only is the beer more expensive for the same crap, but I am not good at meeting people. I'm really good at sitting at the bar, and I'm good at making conversation if someone starts, but the other homos never seem to get my jokes. And too often I seem to get that bit drunker than I wanted to, and then I feel sorry for myself because I'm awkward and don't get it.

And I'm really bad about making stupid jokes as I try to allay my own nervousness, and I'm sure that tends to push people away. Also I don't take compliments well. They make me feel really weird, and when the compliments all seem a precursor to an attempt to remove my pants at some later point in the evening I get even more nervous and act even more stupid and tell even lamer jokes that no one but me gets.

Or maybe gay men just don't get my sense of humor. Of course most people don't get my sense of humor, but I'm used to straight people not getting it, and I'm used to people not really liking me that much until they're forced, for whatever reason, to actually get to know me.

And so I'll go to pride, and I'll see my lesbians, and I'll see the staff at what used to be my regular gay bar, and they'll wonder what I've been doing and where I've been going, and I'll point to the pub which has been getting some of the business the gay bar used to get.

And hopefully I'll pull my head out of my ass and just have a good time. With an extra dose of luck I'll meet people who might become friends once they get that my jokes aren't all stupid and I'm not always a nervous heap of dumbass.

Also, USA USA!

i love the vuvuzela

And other reasons I love soccer/football/futbol. And yes, I get that the vuvuzela is kind of obnoxious, but it's part of South African soccer tradition, and music and noise is part of soccer around the world with all corners of the globe contributing their own thing. Go HERE to see nearly ten minutes of a raucous crowd loving their team and the game with horns and drums and chanting.

Right now I'm on a bit of a kick regarding music and soccer. Part of the fussing of World Cup 2010 is people griping about the vuvuzela. I get a little irritated hearing people bitch about them and even suggesting that they be banned. The English love to sing/chant for their team, and sometimes they love even more to sing to/at the opposition, in the most loving of ways of course. Go HERE for a Wikipedia article about chants in soccer. It's bit of a read, but it's interesting, and in my opinion puts the whole issue in some context, and from there you can do your own googling to find videos of soccer fans singing their club songs. I have to admit to loving Liverpool's fans singing, "You'll Never Walk Alone." Go HERE for a great version.

Another reason I love the game is stoppage time. Yes, I said that I love stoppage time. The referees have the option of extending the game past the ninety minutes to make up for times that play stopped for injuries, whether fake or real, as well as time wasted by either team that the ref felt was unnecessary. And speaking of ninety minutes, that's how long a game lasts. In American football a sixty minute game lasts two to three hours because someone has to make money by showing a string of seeming never ending ads for crap. But soccer doesn't stop except in the middle of the game for half time. There will of course be a few minutes there for ads, but you better get them in quick around the talking heads, because as soon as it's time for the game to restart your ass better be back on the pitch.

Advantage is another advantage. In other sports, whenever a foul is committed, the entire game has to stop to deal with it. In soccer there's this awesome thing called advantage. If I foul you but do not gain any benefit (advantage) for my team, the ref has the option of allowing the game to proceed. He/she even has the option of coming back to the foul later when play has stopped naturally if it's felt that I deserve to be warned about my behaviour. If the foul is flagrant enough or if I gain some advantage for my team, then the ref will stop the game and allow the effected team to restart play with control of the ball, and if I foul you inside my penalty area then I might as well have given you a goal most of the time.

The uniforms are yet another reason to love the game. How can you go wrong with basic shorts and a shirt? How can you not love the huge array of colors and patterns that teams have come up with over the years? Go HERE and scroll down the page for a very tiny sample. I'll add here that soccer players are probably also the hottest, but that's probably just my bias shining through, and this whole reason sounds kinda gay to me, but then . . .

I could talk about this for hours, but I won't. I'll end with one last reason, that the only thing you need to play the game is a ball. I've played games that used a pair of backpacks, strategically placed, to stand in for a goal. I've seen kids play using a spot on a wall as a goal. This is one thing that American football shares, the need for no more than a ball to play the game, and like American football, you don't even have to play a game to have fun. Just hanging out with friends and passing the ball and chasing the ball is a great way to blow off steam and waste a couple or more minutes.

I do love the game. I love the World Cup. And most of all I love my home team. I may not always be happy with the results, and I may rather make out with 90% of Spain's team , but it's USMNT all the way for me.

is friended a word?

Another wrinkle has worked its way into my ongoing internal discussion about the two halves of my life, the out here but not there thing. A mother of one of The Boy's team mates has sent me a friend request on that social networking site we all love so well.

It's that damn internet's fault, making me searchable. I'm certain she could do more searching, and I've realized much before this that I am in fact more out than I can now have any control over. This was a deciding factor in my decision to stop coaching those three-ish short years ago. Okay it was one of any number of equally important factors at the time. Sadly, other coaches proved to me that, at least in my opinion, the league would be better served having me there.

I'm not sure exactly how to go about ignoring the friend request. I can't say that I have any real reason not to accept friendship from someone, but it's Facebook for fuck sake. I've gotta be able to be myself there.

Now I have to admit that I still haven't checked my privacy settings in quite a while and don't know what they're set to. I do remember the big to do that Fb was selling our children or something, and I got a message from someone on the inside explaining what they did and that I could go to this page and set it myself if I damn well wanted to. It was actually a nice message, or nice enough at least. And I did go and at least review my settings, but I don't know as of this moment which package I chose to go with.

I do know about my pictures. I may not be able to tell you without looking what all is there, but I've seen them all, and I know. There are a couple that other people might choose not to include. And it certainly makes me seem as though I drink more than I want most people to think. And there's that one from the birthday party and more than a couple in which I might look kinda gay.

And that's the thing, the information that gets out. I can only control it so much, and I only want so much to control it. I don't want to live a lie ever again. I don't want to have to be in the closet, and I don't want to have to have a sign over my head flashing HOMO whenever people see me. It's an essential element, and I can't know for certain how it informs and influences my choices and my approach to people and situations, but that's not really the question. I want to just be me with the homo part just that, a part of the whole.

And I'm left with not really knowing what to do. I'm going to tend toward my original plan of ignoring this person's likely well intended request. I mean, how do you tell someone, "I'm sorry, but I can't be your friend. You've stumbled on a part of my life where I'm able to be out and open, and since I don't really know you, even though I'm your child's very first ever soccer coach, I must respectfully ignore your request because of things I'd rather not discuss with you that, depending on your sociopolitical leanings and/or religious beliefs, may cause you to abruptly and distinctly change your opinion of me. I hope you understand."

two don'ts

Soccer practice today was an easy one. Practice tends to start with the kids passing the ball. We don't all arrive at the exact same time, and of course I usually try to be there early. I need to set the field up both with whatever cones I'll need as well as doing the pencil check.

The field we are currently using is just a big, mostly crappy rectangle of mostly grass and pencils and is part of a local middle school. As kids walk across the grass to and from school they lose a variety of items. I do sometimes find a pen, but for the most part I can count on finding five to ten pencils, most of them broken.

As my team slowly arrives around and about the start time they've learned to just go ahead and start passing the ball as we wait for me to actually start practice. Often they will tend to pair up, and often I'll put them in pairs or groups.

Big Brother and I were running late which means we arrived at five instead of ten till. There was one of my team on the field with his dad and younger brother, and between the three of them they were passing both a soccer ball and a football. Another player was in his car and came to the field as I arrived while a fourth player also soon arrived.

I knew this would be a lightly attended practice. The local kids are out of school on spring break, and it's the week before Easter. We don't even have a game this weekend. As I've done in the past I told the families that I'd be willing to have practice but knew not to expect them all. One kid's mom already told me he'd be at the beach.

So four kids out of twelve and one coach. We spent half of practice just passing the ball between each other in a big circle. I did my best to NOT coach as part of an idea I had for practice. It's arugable that more kids finding the joy in simply passing the soccer ball would increase soccer enjoyment in the US and would then lead to better plays in the US, and no I don't think it's a bit of a stretch, but it's also not why we're here right now. We were all finally thirsty, and when the water break turned into sitting around for an extra five minutes I let it. I picked one of the four team to play with me, and the rest of the practice was just playing soccer, me and the kid versus the other three kids. I told them specifically that it wasn't a scrimmage in fact, and I continued to do my best not to coach. My goal for today was to have fun playing soccer, and none of the kids really wanted to go when I told them we were don't, but I knew their parents were ready.

And now we get to the title of this post, two don'ts. When you are thirty seven, you really need to adjust how you play any sport with kids. If you are in good physical shape then you shouldn't really play your hardest. You need to dial it back a bit. When you are in less than good physical shape you might still want to ease up. In one instance it's not fair to the kids, and in the other you wind up nearly killing yourself.

I imagine we all know about kicking a soccer ball, but for those that don't there's one basic fact you should know. You do not kick with your toe. I would wager that most sports with any amount of kicking involved don't actually involve the toe in direct contact and for a variety of reasons. One reason is that it hurts your toe, and my toe hurts.

I do know how to kick a ball, but in my defense I was doing the other don't, and so I probably deserved the bit of toe pain.

A slide tackle is a desperation move, and in one of today's rare coaching moments I used my own bit of breaking a rule to explain to them the idea of a slide tackle as desperate and a last resort. What I didn't discuss with them is the idea of not slide tackling when you're the coach and supposed to be coaching and not slide tackling.

I let myself get a little too involved. It was all fun of course, and I didn't actually slide tackle a player. I and the ball were well ahead of him, and my team mate was open. What should have been a quick and neat move turned out really poorly. I hit the ground and didn't slide, landing on my calf and knee. The foot that was supposed to gracefully come around and contact the ball with the top ended up going straight on, toe first. The ball was moving pretty quickly as my momentum brought me into contact.

The wound is slight and won't effect anything, and I accept that it's entirely a product of poor decision making. The take away message, above and beyond the two don'ts, might be knowing when to dial it back. There's never a reason to not do your best, but there are valid reasons sometimes to not play your hardest.

in the closet? or just inside the shadow?

My Google reader has over two hundred unread items in it again. That isn't that many, but it does represent a couple of days of lessened computer time. Between Friday evening and Saturday late night lately I'm fairly busy.

Friday evening is soccer practice with the boys followed by attempts at feeding them healthy food, getting them into bed then obsessing over what I might have missed at their practices, what I can do to make the games go well and hoping none of that keeps me from getting to sleep.

And when I start cutting back computer time or just having less time for it, often my email is the first thing to get overlooked unless I'm expecting something. And I missed a comment recently to my most recent post as it came in just before the weekend mania.

The comment is from a blogger I enjoy who also happens to author one of two blogs hailing from Canada that I enjoy reading, Tossing Pebbles in the Stream and A Small Corner of Nowhere.

The comment was to my most recent post about the idea of deliberately outing closeted politicians who work against the interest of gay people. Sadly, when I saw that I had a comment, I had to go to the blog post to remember what I'd posted. I suppose it's been a while.

It's always interesting to have comparisons from people used to life in Canada but who are also well aware, through experience, of life in the US. I have to assume it's the subtle differences. And that's sorta what the comment made me think.

But then the idea of the closet crept back up.

There's some idea of levels of outness that I've considered before, quite possibly even thought about on occasion. There are so many variables that work into this equation when I really stop to think about it. One basic question to ask is Who Knows? The followup question is Are They Cool? Two distinct examples come to mind, work and soccer.

I'm pretty much completely out at work. There are a few new employees that I haven't told directly, but I can only imagine they'll figure it out soon enough. I work in a part of town that has a lot of cool places and hosts a lot of my friends, people I've met over the years of working and hanging out in the vacinity, some living in the area and some scattered throughout the city. Of the people living closest the demographic is young, hip, probably with more than a little money while the visitors are pretty much everybody in town for various events over the course of a year.

It's a safe place to be out, and it wouldn't matter anyway since enough people know that I have to assume that everyone knows. It's freeing to not give a shit. It's not nearly as gay as I'd like to see it, but even before I was out it was where I loved to be, where my two most regular bars are still. I'm accepted now just as I was before.

In this place, these several city blocks of this town, I feel like I'm just me. I can dream that I could meet someone and poetic nonsense will happen, and then a happy ending that involves growing old together with no wind chimes indoors.

And then there's soccer. Obviously, this is the place where it matters least. This is also one place I'd currently sorta most like it to not come up.

From the direction of our downtown you can follow the four directions to find somewhat different perspectives and opinions on life and politics. While downtown is a more liberal sort of place, driving north takes you into more conservative territory. We're currently in an in between but less lib sort of direction, and our soccer region is mostly the points farther out than us.

I don't want to judge the people who let me coach their children, and I can't know what they think because it doesn't come up. I do my thing, they cheer, maybe we'll win next week, and then the season is over.

I have a whole other complaint here that I feel needs to be somewhat addressed and actually will be in the fall. I'm not sure what happened, but someone noticed something I noticed. One of the ideals I learned from my earliest coaching days with this organization is the idea that complete and total fairness was the ideal. There would be now stacked teams, no all stars beating up the "others."

I've coached some great kids, though not all of them should have been playing soccer. I've seen so many that just didn't really want to be there, but they made the effort, and sometimes I got some really good playing out of them. Some kids just DID NOT need to be there. They hated it, they didn't like or appreciate being pushed to do things they had no interest in, and you never know what to do.

Is there a good way to tell someone to ask their child if they really want to play soccer? This is the first season that Big Brother's team has been full of kids who all seemed interested to be here. Okay, now that I think, I can name a couple that would rather do other, but I also see these kids as being willing to pull together and do something great if I can just . . . They do actually enjoy playing soccer, and I'm refusing now to get sidetracked into the discussion about how kids are different and there are the kids who like playing soccer as well as the kids who hate losing anything. That's a great idea for a blog post, but it's not where we are right now.

I never mean to, but thinking about soccer gets me into a certain groove, and this is a great year for that. I stopped coaching for a short time, part of the whole coming out thing. Soccer just seemed too much at the time. Coming back to it is weird because so many of the faces in the organization haven't changed. And it should be mentioned that our preseason coach's meeting is held in a Methodist church. And that's a crap segue to get us back to my point.

I'm making assumptions like Hank Aaron hitting home runs when it comes to the idea that these people might learn their kid's soccer coach is gay, but I don't think that I'm entirely off base when I assume that it could be, at best, uncomfortable to have to deal with it. And there's the point that it kind of doesn't matter at all in this lone place and time. And while I don't see it ever coming up, I can imagine it ending poorly for all interested parties.

I would prefer people know. If they are accepting then it makes my life easier, and it shouldn't change or effect anything for them, but that's the main variable here. You just can't know who's cool and who's not.

When I'm downtown, if someone learns that I'm gay and has an issue, I have back up. I have places I can go if I need to, and I have friends that will stand up with me. Among the soccer crowd I have a huge unknown. They don't realize it, but there's a gay amongst them. And he's doing his best to coach your kids, to make them better soccer players and better teammates.

And if we get back to some of those stereotypes of gay people, I have worn my sunglasses in front of them, and on me they're kinda gay, which I'm generally okay with, but I'm sure my "secret" was telegraphed somehow to someone. Also, I love those sunglasses. I saw them on someone else and actually went to WalMart to buy them because I loved them so much. That also might be kinda gay.

drat

hating patience, well, not hating it, just having to be it

This is one of those moments when I feel I have absolutely nothing to say, but I feel compelled anyway. So out with it.

My right hand hurts like hell. It isn't a constant thing, but certain movements are really unpleasant. I can't think of any specific thing I did, but I'm fairly certain there was at least one whanging with the back of the hand some part of the car in my attempts to fix the car.

In the end I gave up on my attempt at car repair. It was breaking the 3/8 to quarter inch adapter that finally did me in. You may remember the 6+2(3) inch adapter that was going to allow me access to the bolts on the exhaust pipe that I couldn't reach, and here too was the demise of the 3/8 to quarter inch adapter. It was a borrowed tool, but it's Craftsman, so it's replaceable.

I did in fact take the car to a shop and have it fixed for a sum more than I'd intended but less than that which I could have paid. I did bring my own oil pan and gasket, so that was money saved, and they found the bottle of oil I had (just in case) and added that in with what they put in.

And I'm ever so happy to have my car back. This feeling of my car is still somewhat new. Momma has had her own car for a short time, and then suddenly my car was leaking entirely too much oil, and as it sat parked for much of the time, not to mention on jackstands two different times, I've driven Momma's car a good bit, and we've had to continue the running each other to and from work that having two cars would have, and will, fix. So I'm back to having a car that is all my own.

I don't have to adjust the seat or the mirror suddenly. They're always right where I left them. It's nice not hitting my knee as I get in and realize the seat is too close to the steering wheel. I may even spill less coffee this way.

I just got a phone call from Momma. She believes my phone is not accepting texts from, claims that she's texted me four times. I don't have any new texts from her, and her phone is the one that's sadly and slowly (or not so slowly) dying. I don't know what to say to that.

And the US MNT beat Trinidad and Tobago in Nashville tonight with Jozey Altidore scoring all the goals in a 3-0 match.

what?

It's amazing what you can do when you're the national team as opposed to some schmuck team. Ninety of 20 should equal an easy win for the US in their upcoming World Cup qualifying match, and if this doesn't bring us a win, then I really just don't know what there is left to do.

You really should just click on the picture to get the full effect. Added to the things I suck at is knowing how to massage an image so that it's clearly viewable in the ol' blog. I'm sure one day I'll know, but right now it's enough that I was able to get a screen capture and then get it to save in a form I could actually post.

And this isn't nearly as sad as the fact that, while I write this, MTV is airing some sort of show involving a contest made up of the game Rock Band. What the hell ever happened to actually starting a rock band? Are we seriously so out of ideas that a video game is worth airing as competition? I guess once the sports networks show poker games then anything is worth showing. Did I mention I saw darts on tv recently? Yeah, it's true.

should've just shut his ass up

Of the widgets on my Google homepage, a couple are news feeds about soccer. I get the little headlines about international soccer and sometimes a tidbit about our own Major League Soccer. I rarely actually click on any of them, only skimming the headlines often enough to know when they change.

HERE is a story I did click on, and I'm curious as to what people think about it. A fan captured on video another fan yelling a racial slur at a player who had just scored. The filming fan posted the video on YouTube, and the racial slur somehow got the attention of MLS. They claim that the racist fan will be barred for life from all league games as soon as they can learn his identity.

Racism has no place in sports (or anywhere else for what it's worth) and it's especially ugly in a sport that can be argued to have brought more of the world's people together than anything else.

So, is a lifetime ban taking away the rights of the fans to express themselves, or is it completely justifiable in the attempt to stamp out the ugliness of racism?

P.S. Maybe soon we'll see more people willing to stand up against homophobia in sports as well as players finally start to come out and admit they are gay.

the roof, the roof

The roof of my mouth, while not on fire, has a certain hurtiness about it. I'm quite sure I know why this is. I spent a large portion of yesterday yelling and or talking loudly.

As per usual for our eight week spring soccer season I was at the fields only slightly late. Along with The Boy one other of my U6's showed up for the game, and the opposing coach was happy to agree that we'd play two versus two. We made it through two thirds of the game before The Boy decided he'd had enough. No amount of urging would compel him to continue playing, and once again the opposing coach was obliging. His team was being absolutely creamed by my guys, though to be fair, The Boy never does really give an entire shit about playing soccer as opposed to just playing, so the other team was actually being quite handled by only one of my guys. I was doing everything in my power to slow him down, and by the end of the game he was doing everything in his power to get the ball to The Boy, however, as I've mentioned, The Boy just doesn't have it in him.

Game two, U10's. We had enough time between games yesterday to run to Burger King (no need to point out the ridiculousness of fast food on soccer day thank you very much) and speed back to the fields.

Where to start on this game? Most of the goals score by the other team were goals my guys should have stopped. How do you get eight and nine year olds to be more aggressive on defense? We certainly could have won this game if I could instill in my team the usefulness of working on passing and shooting with your left as well as right foot, and perhaps this game will be a good way to work on that in our practices this week. We missed at least three goals because the shot was from the left of the goal and taken with the right foot. The kid that missed them has an excellent foot on him and is the same kid that could have scored from the half line earlier in the season.

To their credit, my U10's mostly stayed nearly in position and bunched up much less than usual. They actually passed the ball a number of times and showed us some beautiful plays involving multiple passes. I was immensely proud of the work they did and the fact that they are slowly starting to learn.

We had a couple of hours between soccer and roller derby, too much of which I spent taking a nap. I may have mentioned in the past my disdain for naps as well as my need to not take them. I only ever wake up disoriented and slightly irritated, not exactly the purpose of a nap, and they never seem to be the least bit restful to me.

The bout was exciting even if Hard Knox lost to Memphis 110-55. I'll try to only say nice things, and this is generally my goal as an announcer, to only say nice things. Last night was just hard on a person who attempts to say only nice things.

The highlights of the evening-record ticket sales, record merchandise sales, new location proved we can bring a good crowd of mostly new fans. Word of mouth should make our next bout even bigger. The new location issues that were of concern seem to have been handled handily by support staff/volunteers/husbands and boyfriends and girlfriends of our derby girls. Several of our new skaters are a little less new, perhaps one could say even a little less virginal in that they've skated in a bout against a truly powerful team.

The not so highlights-someone didn't seem to have brought their B team to play our B team. I'm not sure exactly what makes ours a B team because we did have a few of our stronger skaters on the track, but for the most part we seemed to be giving some of the newer and less experienced skaters their chance. As someone pointed out at the after party though, no one drives six hours to lose.

A final highlight-derby is awesome, and I love the way it brings people together. As I mentioned at some point in my announcing, there's nothing like derby to bring the two ends of our lovely state together. And there's a certain something special when, during a timeout for the referees to huddle and discuss referee stuff, watching as the pack dances to the music, girls in Memphis red and Hard Knox green doing a family friendly bit of bump and grind. And they call it derby love.

And so I shouted and hollered and yelled and spoke loudly into a microphone all day. I'm sure I spent some amount of time at the after party being a vociferous bit of an ass. It's cool, but damn if the roof of my mouth isn't just a little hurty today. My throat is tiny bit raspy, but having been an announcer and slightly less a fan, at least I wasn't screaming then and voiceless now.

Oh, and the final, final highlight, the beefcake card. Being a boy, I'm obviously not allowed to join in the coo tag game our skaters so love to share, so when one of our skaters gave me my beefcake card I felt inclined to share. She had brought and was passing out a deck of playing cards which featured mostly nude male models. She was kind enough to let me pick my own, so I was lucky enough to end up with the one that wasn't wearing bondage apparel.

The trick is to not make a huge point of the card but to hold it just obviously and wait. Soon enough the victim looks over and aaaaaaaagggggggghhhhhhhhh they realize they've just seen a cock. Is it only gay men that enjoy seeing cock? Straight men and lesbians I can understand, and they are obviously the most fun targets of this game, but one would think at least a couple of the straight ladies would mind a little less.

first game

Yesterday should have been the third game for my U10 team. It was our first. East Tennessee spring season soccer has never, in my limited experience, been quite the chore this year has become. Our first game was snowed out, and our second game was rained out.

As I approached our field, I met up with a couple of my team members who immediately noticed that we were going to be playing a girl heavy coed team. Of course, my team being all boys, and fairly typical eight to nine year old boys, one of them made a comment suggesting our team should easily win. I was quick to point out that he had no basis for this as he had not seen them play and that the fact that they are girls suggests nothing when it comes to their abilities on the field.

My point was proved soon after as the game began and they scored on us fairly quickly. The one real difference between boys and girls of this age would be physical in that the boy is more likely to come out of fight for the ball still on his feet. This is not meant to disparage the girls only to suggest that the boys are in general going to be a bit bigger and stronger. It's also an argument to not have coed teams after the U6 level whenever possible. But that's another post that I may have covered some time in the past.

This game certainly proved that no matter what any of us may think, girls can play with the boys sometimes, and they can play well. The first half saw our opponents take a fair lead against us. Big Brother was our keeper for the first half, and as I've seen before, he took those first goals very personally before figuring out to move and pounce. He soon stopped allowing goals and even took down a couple of their players diving onto the ball.

The second half saw us close the gap. We actually should have won the game on an offside call, though not necessarily due to the call. I saw the goal, but I didn't see offside nor did I not see offside. What I did see was the line judge make an offside call, the referee take back the goal and the opposing coach argue the call and convince the ref to give them the goal.

And this is my problem here. I could argue neither the goal or the offside call as I didn't see it. The team may have been offside or not. My problem is with the opposing coach arguing and winning. Our ref was a young man of twelve or thirteen years. At that age I don't expect him to have the same skills as an adult when it comes to standing up to an adult. My problem is with the other coach arguing with a child and setting a bad example for all the players on the field.

I teach my teams to accept without argument the calls of the ref. That's how the game goes. You will never agree one hundred percent with the referee, and a good player knows how to suck it up and keep doing his or her best. I expect my players to play that way, and I expect other teams and their coaches to play the same way. I believe this so much that, during our scrimmages, I will make at least one bad call, sometimes more. I want them to know never to argue with the ref. Sometimes bad calls happen. Sometimes the ref misses something. You can not let it interfere with how you approach the game. You suck it up, you let it go and you keep giving your hundred percent. It's seldom personal, and you can't take it as such.

We ended the game tied, and I couldn't be prouder of my guys in their first game. We need to work on getting corner kicks into the air. We need to stop bunching up and stealing the ball from each other. We need to pass more. We need for my one insanely powerful striker to accept that he can't reasonably expect to run around the entire field for thirty to forty minutes, so he should stay in his position.

One moment that gave me a giggle was due to my sweeper. This kid, in our very first practice, when I asked them all their favorite positions immediately piped up with sweeper. He does a great job on the back line. At one point in the game he kicked the ball from the half line into the arms of their goalie and actually hurt the kid's chest. I could see it in the keeper's eyes and here it in the smack as the ball hit him.

Oh, and our team name? Yo Momma. Seriously. Not my decision.

seasonal message

DC United midfielder Ben Olsen knows what Christmas is all about. Click HERE to visit the DCenters blog to read a great piece on what Christmas should be about for us all.

And share the ball!

I just keep talking 'bout the game

Warning, like the other one: gratuitous soccer blah, blah, blah. Best just to turn and walk away.

Speaking of the drill that I thought I'd thought of that I probably didn't really, the funny thing is, I never really thought of that drill since the couple of practices in the very beginning of the season that I used it. Having narrowed down my keeper list, and having little help in the way of other coaches, the drill itself is too much a uni-tasker and would eat into our time. I like it as a way to give the taste of the position to allow them to make an informed decision about it, and I liked that it narrowed the pool.

Having found the two kids best suited to play keeper, I've still been willing to allow a couple of other kids who showed a late interest in the position to have time to work on their skills during practice. I've explained that I need a lot of hard work from them both, though I didn't mention that the class clown nature of their regular practice antics would secretly make them have to work even harder, and one of those two is Big Brother, just so you know I really am being fair. Both these guys are real jokers during practice, but to their credit they've consistently played their best when game time rolls around.

This all came in handy yesterday as my regular keepers didn't show. I had no idea they weren't going to be there, but I did know that Big Brother and the other kid had in fact been working very hard. They've both gone from big time flinchers to pouncing at an attacker's feet onto the ball when they had the bad sense to come into our goal area. Yes, Big Brother did in fact almost take a kid out at the knees diving on the ball. Kid shouldn't have come up in Big Brother's goal area like that.

We won the game, a game that was one of the most exciting I've ever watched at any level of play. We were down our two regular keepers and had one sub. The other team was short a couple of players as well. They got a few past our keepers, but the work my kids have been doing in practice really showed. Both my keepers made some great saves, though honestly, the whole team played well. The win was awesome, but to see them showing that they're learning, that I've helped them achieve this . . . I'm glad I wasn't in the dog pile at the end.

monkey keeper

Warning: gratuitous soccer post, coaching and talking shit on poor, wee widdle kids (not really, the last part at least)

One of the concerns I had going into this season was goal keepers. AYSO U8 keepers don't use their hands, not at all sure why, but in U10 they do. Not only was this my first season coaching this age, but many of my players were new to this level as well. I'm also not a keeper in any way, so I was worried that I wouldn't be able to help my keepers do their job well.

What I didn't expect was for nearly every single kid to express an interest in the position when I asked them all that very first practice. Through the first few practices and even the first two games I rotated most of the kids through the goal. I could tell a few that didn't flinch and seemed able to catch a ball, and the two kids who came to take most of the weight of the position really stood out.

In the end, a drill that occurred to me randomly one night was what came to fix the problem. Even as late as a couple of games into the season, I still had more wannabe keepers than I really wanted. Enter Monkey in the Middle: Keeper Edition.

Even assuming most people know what monkey in the middle is, I'll explain it here to be sure. One kid is designated The Monkey. The rest of the team forms a rough circle around the monkey, hopefully at a comfortable passing distance between players across the circle from each other. The object is for the players making up the circle is to pass the ball across the circle to each other while successfully avoiding giving control of the ball to the monkey. The monkey remains inside the circle until he is able to gain control of the ball at which point he and the last person to touch the ball exchange places. You're not supposed to want to be the monkey, but for some reason I always get the kids that do in fact want to be the monkey.

Monkey in the Middle: Keeper Edition is simple. Using cones, make a circle spacing the cones the width of the goal. You should now have basically created a circle of goals. Into each goal insert one possible potential keeper. Into the middle of the circle place one coach and as many soccer balls as you have. Previous to this you've covered what the keeper is allowed and what is expected of him. Now take turns chipping shots at the kids. Actually take shots at the goal, but place them around the keeper and make them work for the ball. If they stop the ball they give it back. If not they get to run and chase it while you take aim at the next poor, wee widdle player.

This drill, if you have enough kids clamoring for a chance in the goal, gives them all some practice. It could really be a decent drill, and I'm sure someone has already thought of it and uses it quite a bit in keeper clinics. It wouldn't be the first time I thought I'd thought of something that someone else had thought of long before me. What it did for me, in the end, was help me narrow down my list of keepers to two and forced its own demise. I don't get enough time during the week for practice to focus too much on the keepers, so I make sure to come up with games and drills where they can take shots from their teammates. But I'm keeping this drill around for the next time I have more keepers than I need and need a good way to nudge the kids in other directions.

can't have fun?

I have a new favorite line courtesy of Sue Doe-Nim, placed in a post about enjoying your kids. I have a hard time enjoying my own kids sometimes because I get into a bad habit of expecting too much from them. It's hard for me to give them the room to be kids sometimes, but I'm practicing hard at being better at this, and it's slowly seeming more natural to slow myself down or even just shut my mouth.

Sue's line-If you can't have fun with 10 kids and a ball you should seek inpatient counseling

And there you have one of the absolute best reasons to coach youth soccer.

Go and read all of Sue's post. She and her family are not homeschoolers, but you wouldn't know it to hear her talk about having fun with her kids. I don't want to suggest that traditional school families don't love their kids and have fun, but the connections and closeness many homeschool families have is often due to some extent on the choice to homeschool. I'm sure I've dug myself into a pit with my comparisons, but that's pretty much what I do.

tech and soccer

Oh, the joys of modern technology. Momma bought us a new camera for Christmas last year, a lovely thing with all sorts of tricks. We've come up with some pretty cool pictures of the boys playing soccer. We haven't gotten any good derby pictures yet because I suck at trying to do that sort of thing. I haven't figured out how to jump up and down and take pictures at derby bouts, and I just don't have time as I stalk the touch line during soccer games.

Momma discovered the lovely feature that allows you to hold the button down and take a series of pictures. That's how you get over four hundred pictures of a U10 game. It's also how I've learned my team's real need. Nearly every picture seems to be a group of my team, clustered together, kicking like hell at the ball. And I set up our most recent practice based on those pictures.

I need them to learn position, but I also need them to understand the idea of the team as a whole. One of the things I did was sort of interesting in a not-sure-if-it-made-any-impression-at-all sort of way, but it might possibly have seemed to at least been a good prelude to the practice. I had the team form a circle, each boy standing far enough from the team mate on either side so that they could then hold up a ball between them. I was on the outside and would move around, take steps backward, move side to side, and have the team move toward me. The goal was to move together without dropping any balls. I had to keep an eye on them and try to keep their hands on the sides, as the random hand would slip under the ball making it entirely too easy.

Whether or not they learned anything, this was really fun and hard to do. It was interesting to note that, more often than not, they never lost their soccer balls all at once, but several times, the one dropped ball would lead to at least two or three more if not all of them.

Next I made them crazy by almost scrimmaging. I tried my best to force them to walk, and I was constantly stopping play to point out their position and where they should be. It's always fun to tell a bunch of eight and nine year olds that they need to stop bunching like grandma's underwear. Every time I stopped play I would explain what I wanted from them and would then yell, "POSITION" by which I meant for them all to retreat to their respective ends of the field at which point I would restart play by passing the ball randomly into the field and yell, "WALK" because I really did want them to walk. They didn't, but I kept them slow enough so that I could yell things like YELLOW SHIRT, YOU JUST STOLE THE BALL FROM YOUR TEAM MATE and he would have time to think and process that info. Of course this would be when I once again called for the ball and yelled POSITION, and we started all over again.

It might have worked. When I turned them loose to actually scrimmage, they might have looked better. I've got good kids who can play the game; I just have to make them a team of good kids who can play the game and stay somewhat in position.

And in the picture, that is Big Brother with the ball, as if I'd show you the picture where he's goal keeping by sticking his butt out.