Off Line & Upward Bound

Our SAMO girls basketball team made it to the 3rd round of the state playoffs and went down in a heart breaker against Clovis West, a team out of Fresno. We lost by 4 in a back and forth battle. We shut down their 6'3", 250lb center, but we could not contain their star guard who played out of her gourd. She dropped 39 points on us out her team's 61. She bombed threes, drove on three girls at a time and dove on the floor for many balls. She said after in an interview, "I never wanted anything more. I wasn't going to lose." And you have to respect when one's ability matches their drive. She was amazing. Mina just finished her Y league. They lost today in the championship game. She's a superstar though. Her natural athleticism is pretty phenomenal. Here is the other star, Cloe, also 10. This was the team's one-two punch. While Cloe grabbed a defensive rebound, Mina would have already bolted to the other end. Cloe would cock back her arm and rocket a pass to Mina, who was the only one able to catch a pass like that, and would usually finish with a lay up. This happened about five times a game. Can you beat the stance of these girls? Is there anything more beautiful?

Serious Fun

Our Santa Monica Girls basketball team, for the first time in our school's history -- since 1891 when we were hooping it up in long, wool black dresses and sporty hats (and you know I'm giving SAMO the benefit of the doubt that they even let us ladies look at a basketball then) --, we will raise a banner in the gym stating that our girls are the Southern Section Division 1A CIF Champions. We are the Champions! We start our state tournament at home on Tuesday. The night we won the CIF finals, we traveled down to Orange County in ancient school buses, yellow rounded bullet-type buses where the insides looked like vaults; the best that a shoe-string budget can buy. I haven't had my teeth rattled like that on a road trip since my own high school away games. Maya traveled on the team bus and Mina and I traveled on the family bus. There was a third bus that transported faithful students, and the entire boys varsity and JV teams. We brought the noise. We screamed, we stomped, we competitively bantered with the opposing crowd across the court. Man, I swooned when I saw our boys teams clustered together with their rally shirts and painted faces, jumping up and down and creating chants, stomping their feet. In the end, our girls were too strong. They played amazingly. Security wouldn't let us rush the court after the game. The post-game glory was for players, coaches and media only. I gave Mina the camera and told her to weave among the trees on the court and get us photos! They didn't stop her. Here the girls were posing for our local newspaper.

I love this picture of our star player, the one signed with a full scholarship to UCLA for next year. She already knows interview politics. All star athletes do, but I love her nervous tick of shoving her hands in her uniform like that. She does it during games too, sometimes. It's the only vulnerability she shows usually. All the players know Mina already. Here's Mina showing love to players she looks up to. I ask Mina, "Will you play that intensely when it's your turn?" And she says, "Shoot, more intense." I believe her. Here's Mina with our other star player, my favorite player. Both of these girls have a competitive intensity that is incredible to watch. I love when it makes people a little uncomfortable, like, yes we want them to win, but should young ladies act this way. And most of us shout, Most Definitely! Git 'em girls! We like our warriors with swagger, please. And we love them even more when they're gracious and loving to our warriors-to-be.

Face the Wall or Bust!

When I woke Mina this morning, she was wearing an old wrap-around dress of mine from my more corporate dress days, a contribution to her dress-up box. Mina was completely naked underneath the ill-tied dress. She likes to be free, she says. The best part is that wasn't what she was wearing when I tucked her in last night.

Y'know, parenting is a trip. There's no such thing as auto pilot or having it down or I got this completely. I mean, I'm working with complex human beings, as complex as me. How they process and handle things can be a world apart from how I do or the other child; or maybe exactly the same and it could be something I need to iron out myself. Sometimes it all feels natural; zone-like. Other times, I'm improvising like a motherfucker. Like when I realized that Maya has been shrinking a bit in the face of her biggest challenges. It has been a subtle shrink, barely detectable. Her personality is so upbeat and her social life is so on point right now it took me a minute with close examination to realize her shit hasn't been as together as would seem. Believe me, it ain't a major slide or anywhere near drastic -- I mean, she's juggling a lot right now -- but maybe it could have been a tipping point, or a crossroads of a possible, total Fuck Off. I don’t want to wait to find out. There's been a tiny slip in her grades; she's been blowing off difficult reading for honors English; she's been shirking her solo basketball skills practice. Her phone/text game is tight though! And her friends worship her. Boys flock and flounder around for her attention. She treats the boys perfectly; as her goofy, beautiful self, as a homie; "No, I don't want to date you. Let's stay friends!" But in the shadow of her social stardom, a tiny storm cloud looms. And I was all sitting back, admiring her sense of responsibility and the ease with which she handles everything when I happened to notice the lining of the storm, hidden, and I was like, Oh shit, that's my cue, right? I gotta get back in the game, full-press. She broke down a bit when I confronted her. First, she did a nice little teen push back by getting defensive about her chores, another thing she’s slightly blowing off. She told me I was overreacting about not being able to get to them all at the exact time I wanted them done and damnit, she was right. I told her so. I told her I was sorry for overreacting. But the meat of the whole problem -- the slipping and the shirking -- has been fear. A sort of freezing up when things get harder than she thought they'd be. Her English class for example. This teacher is no joke. He's challenging them at a near college level, I think, and she's freezing up more and more because of it. She's locked up, feeling unable to do good enough work or give any worthwhile analyses for this guy. I think she's doing well, but she's feeling the pressure instead of enjoying the challenge. More subtly, she has not been working on the more challenging skills in basketball -- improving her dribble left and right, shooting rhythmically and repetitively -- for fear of not making JV any way. There are only four spots for JV next year and she wants it so badly that she has sort of iced herself mentally. And on top of it all, she's pushing back on chores because, well who wants to do chores? So, man, I could only reinforce that facing all these challenges is the only way not to feel squashed by them. Fuck it; bring it on Charles Dickens and double-team defense. If you can't fully understand the language of Charles Dickens, then understand some of it and do the best you can, right? If you don't make JV, fuck it, at least leave your heart on the court trying. There is absolutely no relief in hoping it all goes away. I know she wants to impress her teacher and I know she so badly wants a spot on JV, but really giving it her complete all for herself is what matters to me. I know she will not be able to top that personal sense of triumph no matter the outcome. I hope she believes me until then. I told her I wish I had given her the genes that made us prodigy-naturals at things, but I don't have that. I only know about working hard. A lot of times, hard work makes me really good at things, and sometimes it makes me just ok. It's her lot too. I think it's a curse to expect to do well at everything you walk into. She has a little bit of that. She doesn’t understand why everything, at any level, isn’t at least kind of easy. The discomfort of realizing that this just isn’t the case is confusing to her. The thick wall of a really tough challenge holds her back. Very gently I asked her, "When was the last time you gave a 110% at something?" She was crying and said, "Tae Kwon Do." I said, "That was so hard, wasn't it? The tests, the tournaments? And you thought you wouldn't get through them, secretly, right? It seemed too much. And when you did, when you did well even, how did you feel?" And she cried and cried.

Y'know, facing it and giving 110% never gets easier, does it? I mean, sometimes it down right sucks ass -- it's so hard! -- but the best thing about being older is knowing what it means to one's sense of self, to defining who we are as a person. I love it/I hate it/Mainly, I love myself for it. Man, I hope it clicks and holds with her. She's so far from mediocre. I mainly wanted to let her know that. Extraordinary is heavy sometimes especially when you have to work at it. It takes a lot of courage.

I had a very similar talk with Mina the week before.

I often think about the speeches I give the girls. Like when I thought I was going to throw up on the spin bike this morning. Or when work seems too much sometimes, or when the (extra)chores get on my nerves, or when my writing waits patiently, again. Just the mustering of energy to be brave can feel too much. I started a new story. The novel became so demanding, and I was making myself feel badly about it until I just faced up and started a story, started to just write. No need to squash all the love out of something just because it's a challenge. My point is, I can't give such heartfelt speeches if it means nothing to me too. It means a lot. I know how important this kind of stuff is.

Speaking of extraordinary, our girls varsity basketball team is playing in the regional CIF final playoff game tonight! If we win, we go on to play for state. State! This is the farthest our girls team has gone in our history. We're all getting on the party bus to travel to Orange County to watch & cheer. Then, I'll give the president of the booster club the $650 you guys helped me raise for the program. Thank you so much. I'm so proud to be able to give that to him today. I run the 10K on Sunday. It's supposed to rain this weekend so that will be fun, on the muddy trail. Can't wait to tell you about that. Or about our win tonight.

Face the Wall or Bust, y’all.