Right. I remember this. It was high school, of course.
It was during Phys. Ed. class, the spring that Coach Spangler made us all play softball, and he picked vanmojo to be one of the team captains. ("Now don't pick all your friends," Spangler told him. "Like hell?" he said. "What else am I going to do?")
We were the worst intramural softball team ever. We had more fun than anybody ever did playing softball— and more fun than anybody playing softball since. We lost every game. But everybody managed to cross home plate at least once— every single one of us.
For some of us, like hyniof, just getting to first base was a minor miracle. But you were one of our secret weapons, as I recall. You'd sucker the jocks on the other team into thinking you were completely helpless with a softball bat. You'd be whistling a little rebel tune when you saw the entire opposing team come inside the baseline as you came to bat. It was especially cool that one time when some of the more openly strong players on our team had loaded the bases for you, and you openly taunted the opposing team.
"Are guys sure you want to come in so close?" you said. They just laughed mercilessly.
On our side of the backstop, we were all trying not to laugh. Not because it wasn't fun to watch you do this to them, but because we didn't want to be seen laughing along with the jocks at your act. They were laughing at you. If we had been laughing, we would have been laughing at them. But it would have been hard to tell that.
I remember every time you cracked one hard and high into a completely abandoned center field, the leather on the ball almost sloughing off from the air friction as it rocketed over the heads of our opponents. I still savor the looks of dumbfounded embarrassment spread across the faces of the opposing team.
You were cruel even then, you know. You'd make a genial offer to sign autographs as you approached the shortstop on your leisurely stroll around the bases. Sometimes, you would backtrack from second to first multiple times, pretending to make sure you tagged first base. Some poor fool would be running like mad for the weeds out by the band practice field, searching for the ball so he might throw you out before you crawled on your belly over home plate in a kind of gloating dance number. It never happened.
Coach Spangler, to this day, will always pick one of the kids from the geekiest cohort to be a team captain for softball.
"Do yourself a favor," he'll say to the poor stupified kid he picks for this torture. "Pick all your friends. Trust me."
He knows not fuck with the affairs of wizards, for it makes them soggy and very difficult to light.
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Date: 2005-11-30 06:07 am (UTC)It was during Phys. Ed. class, the spring that Coach Spangler made us all play softball, and he picked
We were the worst intramural softball team ever. We had more fun than anybody ever did playing softball— and more fun than anybody playing softball since. We lost every game. But everybody managed to cross home plate at least once— every single one of us.
For some of us, like
"Are guys sure you want to come in so close?" you said. They just laughed mercilessly.
On our side of the backstop, we were all trying not to laugh. Not because it wasn't fun to watch you do this to them, but because we didn't want to be seen laughing along with the jocks at your act. They were laughing at you. If we had been laughing, we would have been laughing at them. But it would have been hard to tell that.
I remember every time you cracked one hard and high into a completely abandoned center field, the leather on the ball almost sloughing off from the air friction as it rocketed over the heads of our opponents. I still savor the looks of dumbfounded embarrassment spread across the faces of the opposing team.
You were cruel even then, you know. You'd make a genial offer to sign autographs as you approached the shortstop on your leisurely stroll around the bases. Sometimes, you would backtrack from second to first multiple times, pretending to make sure you tagged first base. Some poor fool would be running like mad for the weeds out by the band practice field, searching for the ball so he might throw you out before you crawled on your belly over home plate in a kind of gloating dance number. It never happened.
Coach Spangler, to this day, will always pick one of the kids from the geekiest cohort to be a team captain for softball.
"Do yourself a favor," he'll say to the poor stupified kid he picks for this torture. "Pick all your friends. Trust me."
He knows not fuck with the affairs of wizards, for it makes them soggy and very difficult to light.