Hazards at the YMCA

I grew up in rural Nevada around horses. When you take a saddle off a hot dusty horse and turn it out into a field, often it will buck and kick its legs and roll around on the ground, presumably getting the feel of the saddle off its body. I finally realized when watching Mark play in his basketball game at the YMCA on Saturday that that is what Mark reminds me of when he plays.

When Mark plays basketball, it is with pure joy. Mark approaches everything with either pure joy or real contempt. He’s an intense kid and feels things strongly. And he loves being in a gym.

He doesn’t at all get the concept of basketball. He runs around, sometimes making zooming noises, sometimes holding his head to the side like he’s trying to resist the g forces. Occasionally, seemingly as an afterthought, he’ll steal the ball, or grab a loose ball but then he doesn’t really have a clear concept of what to do with it and he hands it off…usually to one of the timid little girls on the team.

You can imagine that little kids who are really into the game and really get the concept of basketball get irritated with Mark. Who is this wild-eyed red head and why is he disrupting our game? Similar to how Mark is either really happy or really not, kids seem to either really like him or really…not.

A lot of kids genuinely like Mark. They go out of their way to say hello to him. I have watched out my window and seen neighborhood boys actually coming to blows fighting over Mark’s attention. There are those that feel otherwise though. I was visiting teaching once and a small boy came down the stairs and told his mom that it was time to go home. She said, “But you are home.” He pointed upstairs to where Mark was playing (and presumably ruling the roost) and said, “No, HIM.”

There have been several athletic basketball playing boys that feel the same way. Get him out of here. As paroxysmal as Mark is in his basketball playing, he is really pretty fast, strong, athletic and aggressive (he got none of those qualities from yours truly) and when he decides he wants to get the ball, he’s hard to stop. This doesn’t further endear him to anyone.

So Mark’s been shoved, kicked, punched and tripped. It never really bothers him much. I don’t like to see it but I usually just let it go because unlike my other two who I feel such a compelling urge to protect, Mark seems somehow like he doesn’t need my protection.

On Saturday there was an intense kid on the other team. He was also a red head but with a buzz cut and a UW headband on his shorn head. He was a pretty good little player and was in control of most of the game. Mark randomly decided to go after a loose ball and got it from the other kid. The other guy yelled out in rage and pounded on the mat that covered the wall (so that’s why they placed the mats there). Then he started kicking the wall. Mark was oblivious and handed the ball to this little girl, Isabella who is so tiny I’m afraid she’ll fall over if Mark runs by her too fast. Mark zoomed away, probably forgetting the whole incident.

The other player did not forget. He got in Mark’s face and tried to underhandedly get him for the next few minutes. Mark didn’t seem to be minding so neither did I.

Then it happened. Mark was running down the court. Headband kid was standing his ground. I saw a particular look in Mark’s eye. He lowered his shoulder like a football player and literally flattened the kid. I yelled out, “Mark!” and I told Adam, “He did that on purpose!” Adam said he was sure that was not true.

I knew better. And I ejected my son from the game. I took him off the court and held him on my lap…on the floor because there are never enough chairs at those games. Other mothers smiled over at me with an understanding smile. They’re the mothers whose children sometimes run crying from the court because they’re hurt and they then sit on their mother’s laps. I smiled back. Let them believe that Mark is sitting here because he’s hurt, I thought. He was really sitting there because he was in trouble. I asked him if he had done it on purpose. “Yes,” he admitted in a small voice. “That’s a mean kid.”

No flattening other players, Mark. You just can’t.

Since I gave birth to this big strong kid, I figure it’s my duty to civilize him. Teach him things like don’t knock kids over.

I do take comfort in the fact that for all the abuse Mark takes from frustrated kids on the basketball court, he is really very good-natured. He is a head taller than almost every other kid and could conceivably flatten them all if he decided to. He’s usually just happy to be in a gym and happy to share with the smaller kids who would otherwise never get a chance to touch the ball.

And like Adam said, “No one complained when Mark knocked that kid down.”

Of course we won’t mention that to Mark. We’ll just tell him, “No flattening other players. You just can’t.”