growing old sucks

So, i've been playing softball on a team with other parents from the kids school. I could never have imagined how much fun it would be. After one game i was feeling competitive and sparky, spunky.

I was an athlete in a previous life. Competitive diving for ten plus years. I gave all that up when the all-consuming hormonal rush of late adolescence took hold of me. Then i dressed in black, drank black coffee and wrote poetry until the hormones of marriage and children took over.

But now! Now i am back. I love the games. The fun. And, of course, the beer.

Really though i want to win. Every game i want to win. And we lose. We are parents. Out of shape, sloppy parents playing against a bunch of young people who can drink copious amounts during the game and still beat us. Tonight we did better. Lost by one point.

Many of us have been injured. Injuries of old folks. Pulled groins. Sore backs from leaping for bad throws (lots of those.)

When i hit the ball and raced to first base i pulled something or other in my thigh. I hobbled through the rest of the game because "there's no crying in baseball!" My husbands the coach. That's what he yelled to me when i was beaned with a ball in the thigh last week.

Now i am laying down with ice on my thigh, hoping it will be all better for the game on friday.