Kids in Sports

The drunk-on-pancake-mix interns over at Guerrotype are worried about this article.

Look, nobody wants to be "that asshole dad". Luckily, I am not a father, so I could give two shits.

When it comes to expecting anything athletically from your sons, it has to be a case-by-case basis. I was a pretty good athlete when I was in high school. Brothatime!! was the best athlete in our entire school his senior year. Meanwhile, our Dad never went to a single game: he didn't come to a Little League game, he didn't come to a junior varsity football/basketball/baseball game, and he didn't come to any of our varsity games. Nobody knew less about or gave less of a shit about sports than my dad, but he was always happy that we played. We'd come home and he'd ask "how'd you do?" and we'd tell him and no matter what he'd say "so, skunked 'em!", and he'd have no idea what the hell the score meant, in any sport. I might've come THIS close to having my neck snapped, but my dad was too busy reading a journal about the 1849 24th Canadian Mounted...whatthefuckever.

I have two godsons and a nephew. First of all, my nephew is fucking nuts - he loves beating the shit out of his friend ...cough..."Zack"...who's almost twice his age, and last time I was visiting, we played football so fierce it drew blood. He loves having the shit beaten out of him; ten years from now, you're goddam right I hope he's playing high school football and beating the hell out of the other kids, and you're damn right I'm gonna beat the hell out of him every moment I can between now and then. Oh, I'll never make a sound from the bleachers, and I'll never go to the Coach "you better start my nephew!", but I'll be disappointed if he doesn't crack some fucking skulls. In other words, if he decides to play tennis instead of football I'll suppport him and will attend every match, but I'll be weirded out.

As I said, I have two godsons. One of them has already made it clear he's not the competitive sort - he doesn't care for sports, score-keeping, or physical contact. And that's okay. I love him more than anything in the world, so if he wants me to accompany him to whatever the heck activity, I'll do it with a smile on my face. Sports ain't his thing, which is fine. Will prolly do me good, to be honest.

My other godson, however, loves three things: competition, rules, and score-keeping. You're goddam right that ten years from now I'm gonna be busting his hump to play better; hell, he's already a better baseball player than I ever was and he's only 6! I got no problem hitting ground balls at his face until it gets dark, since I know that's what he wants. He thrives on being a competitor and I love that about him, but...if all that changed, I'd still love  him.

You can only take it kid by kid.