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Thursday, March 17, 2011

High Stress Situations--Little League

Little league baseball. Three words that really don't evict a whole lot of emotion for me. Until this week. We signed Eli up to play and his first practice was supposed to be Tuesday. It rained so it ended up being yesterday. He was nervous. I was trying to be supportive and encouraging, telling him that he'd be fine & he'd have fun, when I realized as I was running around like a crazy person between school, preschool, the chiropractor, the babysitter's and the ballfield....that I was a little nervous too. Downright butterflies in my stomach, shaky hands kinda nervous. I took a deep breath, realized I was wearing my big girl panties already and walked my 5-year-old to the field. It's not like they were gonna ask me to throw a ball or anything...why was I so nervous?

I was worried that I wouldn't know anyone (cause, ya know I've lived in this town since I was 10...chances are I'd know at least one person there!) Or maybe I was nervous that I would know them and it would be someone who's feelings that I hurt in the 9th grade or maybe she hurt mine (why do girls carry that crap around for years?!?!) I was worried that they wouldn't like my kid. What if he got out there and flipped out and cried or couldn't hit or catch or run at all? (Just evidence that he really is mine!)

The more I've thought about all this nervousness....the more I want to laugh at it. (And the more scared I am for kindergarten to start in the fall.) I know we all feel it. That pressure to not have the weirdo kid or to be the weirdo parent. When in all actuality, we're all going to have/be the weirdos at some point. If there's anything that I've learned in my life it's that everyone's the weirdo sometime. There are those people who never screw up. Never wear sweats, never not have their makeup just so, never have snot smeared all down their arm. You know 'em, they've got it together. Always. They're annoyingly perfect. But really, they're just good at looking that way. Somewhere, they're falling apart. Somewhere, sometime, they're facing issues that run just as deep as mine. And as mean as it sounds.....it makes me breathe a little easier. Cause we're not perfect. My kid may not be the allstar and he is definitely going to melt down sometime. Occasionally I'm not gonna have tissues and I'm gonna have to wipe snot on my jeans (we've had a lot of snot lately). Cause we're REAL people. And that's fine. I just need to remind myself that they're all real people too.

2 comments:

  1. Love it! And anytime you want to feel like you've got it all together just come see us and you'll feel perfectly put together.

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  2. You have it way more together than you give yourself credit for! And like I have always said/thought who cares what those people from that small town think! :) You are wonderful and yes you are human--but a pretty awesome human if you ask me!

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