I have two siblings. Both sisters. All of us were athletes of one kind or another. I am the oldest and I was a equestrian. I know something about soundness in athletes other than just myself. The Middle Sister, we have met before, she still is alive with a brain tumor. She engaged in tennis. Never an injury and competed for awhile. The youngest sister was a tomboy through and through. She loved to play sports. Didn't matter what it was she was just 'out there' and having a good time. She never sustained a serious injury that disabled her from her game until she was an adult and after college competition at the Semi-Pro Women's Baseball League.
The reason we never had injuries is because my parents loved us more than they loved the competition. They knew when we were ready to compete and they knew how to encourage our competitive nature without destroying our bodies. My father especially. He was a State Champion Baseball Pitcher in Pennsylvania in his High School years. He went into the Air Force and the Korean War after that. My dad did and still has a great head on his shoulders. He has seen four grandsons all compete in one sport or the other and cheered most of them on as they went into State Champion competitions, on the field or on the mat.
Now.
About what athletics are all about. It ain't about winning. A well prepared athlete wins. A team that is well prepared and competeing in appropriate limits wins.
Athletics are about making a mind, body and emotional connection to the real world in a social environment. It is good sportmanship. It is being concerned about the limits of one's body and how best to achieve goals realistic to child, adolescent competition that leads to a lifetime of joy and health.
My youngest sister. She is incredible. She was playing Little League Softball at the age of seven years old. Loved it. Couldn't get enough of it and it was not unusual for her to grab my father's hand after coming home from work to pitch and catch a few. He was in Father Heaven with this child. However. His first question was always the same; "Did you get all your homework done? Do I have test grades or report cards to see? What are you working on in schoold?"
As the years went by and my sister became an athlete unto herself she developed a beautiful pitching style. She also loved to catch. "Play ball" was life to her. She obeyed the umpires and eventually as a young adult with a need for a part time income in college became an umpire herself.
As she entered High School and competed there she found an emptiness in her training. An emotional connection she loved as a child that somehow got turned over to other adults called coaches. She slumped. No injuries, just this lack lust performance. At that point, she went to my father whom attended many of her games and asked him to coach her and her team. Now, mind you, this is a High School team with a paid High School coach. My dad was at a loss for words and his first instinct was no. She had come all this way and she needed to get 'real' about life.
One day, the team showed up at my house. All of them. They all asked my father to be their coach and they would make the arrangements. He still didn't know what to say and his decision was now postponed. He didn't know how that could be achieved but smiled with an emotional tear in his eye and said if they could find a way to include him as a coach he would be happy to do it. But. He wanted no circumstances that would cause bad feelings with the current coaches whom he esteemed.
Within a few days afterwards, the team showed up again and this time with the head coach of the woman's softball team. She and my dad exchanged hand shakes and he began to apologize when she stopped him in his first seven words. She stated, they didn't all really need another coach as they had asked him, but, they definately needed a mascot that could help with workouts and could even travel with them on the bus, officially as their team mascot. It wasn't a paid position of course, but, only volunteer.
Like I said, my father was in Father Heaven with this child.
So, off he went to every training session he could attend and every after hours practice the girls arranged. My youngest sister was in Child Heaven again. She found her feet under her again and she was regarded as the most valuable player her team had. The spirits were always high and Dear Old Dad, as mascot of course, keep the cooler full of all the necessary sports drinks and ice packs. The team went on for four High School years to set goals every year, improving their skills and winning local and then state championships. No real injuries to set them back, plenty of laughter when skills were not easily learned and a coaching staff that grew ever closer to their players. Like I said, my Dad had a great head on his shoulders. So, did my Mom. She never stopped him and attended whatever activities she could without making only one daughter her life.
My youngest sister, Judy is her name, is a great person. She enjoyed and still enjoys athletics. She has a four year degree from Kean College and competed at the Semi-Pro Level during college competing against teams like "The Budweiser Bells." She is today a wife and a parent herself. She met her husband in a 'Sports Bar' where they came to realize they were both talented pitchers. He played softball as well. She didn't meet the man of her dreams in an office of success oriented professionals. Her two sons are wonderful athletes. They play ice hockey, La Crosse and golf. Oh, yeah. Baseball, too. Judy and Dave coached a team for a while.
She is an incredible person, works a very responsible job, smiles when all seems impossible and continues to be an athlete defining herself uniquely in life. She is forty-five now and only last year played the last game as a goalee in an Ice Hockey Women's League. She put herself on the sidelines after Dr. Murphy finally reconstructed her right knee with cadavor bone. Her only plaguing injury was her right rotator cuff as a College Woman. It never disabled her. She pitched right handed. She was never a 'south paw' like my Dad.
Judy is a lucky girl. So am I. I had a man as a father and not a frustrated parent hell bent on winning regardless the ability of the child. My father loved the sport. He didn't love the competition. He played to win, but, he played to win as a good sportman. His dignity in all he did in life transended every aspect of his parentage and he was rewarded in ways others only dream of. My mother loved to be the cheerleader, much as she did in her High School years. She never lost faith in her children to achieve or her husband to be their father.
The moral of the story is that children love so intensely they don't know their own limits. It is upto the adults surrounding them to nurture their abilities and show them their limits while respecting their desire for higher achievement.
As my Dad always said, "There is always next week. There is always next year. The best trip down the road isn't necessarily with the trophy so much as loving the journey along the way."
