Everybody's changing and I don't feel the same

Pardon me for titling my post using lyrics from a Keane song...I'm a little embarassed that I did that, but that song has been in my head all day and it seems appropriate.

As I mentioned in some previous posts, I teach school. I also coach. I help coach boys and girls' middle school basketball. I love it. I know a little bit about basketball and I like to teach what I know to the kids. I'm comfortable with basketball, I know what to expect and I usually know what to do in certain situations. I also helped coach high school softball my first two years and it was one of the most rewarding decisions I have ever made.

It started as a favor for one of my friends at the school. He was coaching softball and did not have an assistant. I was already committed to the baseball team as an assistant coach for them, but the chance to work with my friend and also have about fifteen less games was enticing. I ran it across the baseball coach and he said no problem, but he thought I was making a mistake and that I wouldn't have as much fun. The first year was great and we made it to the game before the state tournament. We lost 12-5 to a team we should have beaten, one of our players got in a fight and I was ejected. It was a horrible way to end the season. The girls cried, my buddy cried, I cried (and I don't cry). I remember them all sitting in a circle and Jody (my friend and the head coach) talking to them and his sentences and words being broken up by his voice shaking. My wife and I went to eat after the game, but I had no appetite. I didn't want to talk, I just felt like sleeping. I just wanted to go to bed. It felt like someone close to me had died. I can't describe it any other way. That's just how it felt. I had never felt that with basketball to that point. There was so much emotion and when it was over it was heartbreaking. The picture is of our region championship on May 16, 2004.

The next season wasn't nearly as successful. We picked it up towards the end and were only one game short from our previous season. At the end of the season, Jody resigned as coach and I picked up Middle School girls' basketball, so I dropped softball and I didn't think I would regret it. I did. I still do, but I know it won't be the same if I go back. Jody's gone, some of the girls I was closest to are gone and I wouldn't want to try to replace those two years with something that would only fall short.

Tonight, we had dinner with Jody and his family. His wife was saying how it was sad to see how fast her kids were growing. They are only three and two years old, but she said it has gone by so fast. I understood what she was saying. Soon I 'll be saying that. I already know how it feels.

Last night I was lying in bed and I could feel the dampness of an early April night after a game. I could smell the mix of grass with the dew that had settled with the darkness. And I miss it all the time. I miss the cold February practices, I miss hitting balls as high as I could to the outfield, I miss coaching first base, I miss the bus rides to away games, I miss being made fun of by the girls, I miss it all. I miss the way the dirt smelled and I miss the way the air felt when I was driving home in my jeep after a game.

Tomorrow I am eating lunch with two of my former players. They are sophomores in college now. One of them broke her thumb when she was a junior and I used my shirt to stop the bleeding. I helped the other with her senior term paper and rediscovered how much I love Jay Gatsby. I am glad I still keep in touch with them. I hope someday to receive wedding invitations and birth announcements from them. And then maybe I'll feel old. Right now I just miss it.

I see myself in my mirror everyday and it's easy to lose track of time. You get your bearings by watching other people age, not yourself. In about a month, my scale of time will be measured by an infant, then a toddler, then a child, then a pre-teen, then an adolescent and so on. And maybe I'll never feel the same. Everybody's changing and I don't know why.