we spent the day at the anaheim sports center watching tessa's team play volleyball. we left the house at 6:30 a.m., and for the next twelve hours, she played ten long games of volleyball.
she and her teammates worked their little spandex-covered butts off, fought hard for every point, smacked the bajeebies out of the ball, serving, digging, setting, talking it up, circling up to celebrate each time they made a point. we're talking high intensity energy output--every minute of every game. tessa played libero during one game, because their starting libero had to leave the tournament early to perform in her school dance recital performance for her final grade. (where are her priorities anyways? sheesh.) for those of you who are new to volleyball, as i was just a few short years ago, the libero is the one who plays in the back row with the different colored shirt on. (my eye is always drawn to the libero. her jersey adds such a nice contrast to the team's otherwise uniform uniform! and it makes her seem kinda spunky and rebellious, in a good way, dressing differently from everybody else.) anyways, back to my point. the libero's job is to do whatever it takes to not let the ball hit the floor, whether it means sacrificing life, limb or ruining her orthodontia. all that to say, tessa spent that game diving, rolling, sliding across the court, etc. (and she did a great job, i might add.)
while the girls played their hearts out, we parents sat in the bleachers, spectating at an extraordinary level--clapping, cheering, and giving each other high fives. and during time outs, when our daughters were being corrected by the coach, the dads put their heads together and analyzed which girls were having a bad day and what the coach was doing wrong, and we moms shared stories about our daughters as babies and other random familial antecdotes. all that talking we did was exhausting!
when the girls weren't playing, they had to referee the games of the other teams in their pool, standing inside the sweltering gym. while the girls refereed, we parents sat outside under a shady canopy, eating fresh fruit and pasta salad with sundried tomatoes, shooting the breeze.
the day finally ended at about 6:00 p.m., and alan and i were completely spent from all that intense spectating. when we got home we pretty much fell over comatose onto the couch with the intent of staying there until it was time to roll into bed for the night. but after her shower, tessa came down the stairs and asked if she could meet some friends at the movies, because she "hadn't gotten to do anything all day."
we told her that we were too tired to drive her the two miles down the street to the neighborhood theatre, and reminded her what a long day it had been. she looked at us with an incredulous look and shook her head, and i promise i could hear what she was thinking--
"wimps."
2 comments:
holy volleyball batman! we just got back from the zoo for only 4.5 hours and we're totally pooped! if you're getting old, then what does it mean for me?
I promise, I know what you mean about hearing what other people are thinking. I thought it was only me! Sometimes I'm too afraid to let them know I heard! Maybe it's a Hedrick women thing, or a mother-daughter thing. I don't know.
Post a Comment