This post isn't about anything deep. I couldn't think of anything that I could really put into words and sound sane, so I gave up and decided to write about something pointless.
My dad recently joined the men's softball team at my church. The men's team has a problem right now, because they have 2 games tomorrow, but they haven't had any practices. You can see how this could be a rather large problem. They played a game last Monday and lost pretty bad. I felt awful for them. Some of the guys did pretty well, some of them didn't. That's kind of how it is with most teams, especially church teams. See, on church teams most of the guys (my dad included) aren't there to win at all, they're only there to have fun.
I think it's good that they want to have fun, but some of them are so incompetitive it kills me. I'm so competitive! Just ask the guys I played football with at camp last year. It doesn't even matter if I'm good at the sport. I'm really not good at football. I'm a good runner, but that's about it. Guys are so forgiving toward me, though. They still tell me I'm awesome, no matter how bad I am.
Sometimes I wish they'd tell me the truth, though. I mean, I see it all over the place, a lot in church, and even more in the homeschool community. No matter how bad a kid is at doing something, their parents tell them they are wonderful at it, so the kid continues to make a complete idiot out of themself, and they have no idea whatsoever. It's so sad.
I knew this girl that thought she could sing. Her parents told her she was a wonderful singer, her parents friends told her she was great at it, but when she got up on stage and wailed her song out you wanted to put your hands over your ears and scream, "No more! Please stop! You're killing me here!" It was all I could do to paste my eternal smile on my face and not wince. Maybe I'm just harsh, I don't know, but I do know that I wasn't the only one who thought that way. I wonder why her parents told her the things they did.
I was talking to my brother about this last week. It may sound thoughtless, but why not just tell someone, "Ya know, I love you, but singing just really isn't your strong point. Why don't you find a different hobby that you can really succeed at?" Perhaps not in those words, but something along those lines.
Not to say that I'm without fault here either, but I do try to be honest in the nicest way possible. It's like when one of your friends asks you, "Am I pretty?", but you really don't think she is. I also hate, "Do you think I'm fat?" Um... Well... What does one say? I have a friend who asks me this question all the time! I hate sounding rude or inconsiderate, but I think it's even more inconsiderate to lie to them so they won't be mad. I mean if I asked my friend if she thought I was fat, I'd want her to tell me the truth straight up. I wouldn't want her to say, "No, you're the perfect weight. Not to fat, not to skinny," while everyone else thought, "Wow, that girl could definitely stand to drop a few pounds." I usually end up telling her, "Well, I think that you would feel better and be healthier if you lost a little bit of weight." Is that harsh? I know that we are supposed to speak the truth in love. It's getting that love part across that's the difficult part.
So anyway, that was way off subject. I told my dad that I would practice with him at home. It's kind of a good thing that he signed up for this softball thing, because it gives me an excuse to get him out there exercizing. My mom is always telling me, "I want you to get your dad to exercize with you." I'm not sure why she thinks that I can do that, but I try anyway. I ask him if he wants to go out jogging with me. He never does. But see, if you say, "Hey dad, do you want to go out and practice softball?" he actually has a reason to do it, therefore he's a lot easier to convince.
So there we were, practicing softball in the pasture. I'm really sorry that I'm the only one he can practice with, because I'm the worst softball player I've ever seen. I couldn't hit the ball if you paid me a million dollars, I can't throw very well, and my catching? Well, let's just say I'm lucky that I didn't get a blackeye from where that ball nailed me on Saturday. He was spending more time trying to teach me stuff than really practicing. It was actually good, because he's a pretty good hitter, so he was trying to teach me how to hit. He ended up pitching to me most of the time. He got a lot of practice at that, because I think he pitched to me about 25 times and I only hit it about 5.
While we were outside dad decided to burn the big heap of wood and junk. We throw things that we don't need onto this pile and burn it every once in a while. We were out there for about 4 hrs, and I forgot my sunscreen!!! I have no idea how that happened! You can ask anyone who knows me, I'm almost a nazi for the cause of sunscreen. Any time we go on an event, I'm armed with multiple bottles of sunscreen. I ask everyone, "Have you put on sunscreen?" If the answer is no, I give them a whole bunch. If their answer is yes, I give them some anyway. The guys hate it. They usually end up putting it on anyway, but I guess they don't think it's very manly. Yeah, so when they don't catch a ball they blame it all on the sunscreen. *snort* Yeah right.
So today I'm really sunburned, and my muscles are killing me. I was chasing so many balls, and I didn't want to make him wait. I retrieved them as quickly as possible. One thing that I can say for myself is that I give 100% when I play sports. I'm a litte sore and sunburned today, but I'll survive!
A Crispy Critter,
Anna
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