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By SARAH SMILEY
No Easy Outs
From previous columns, you have probably gathered that I’m a little sensitive when it comes to my boys’ athletics. But in case you had any doubt, I recently proved it to a crowd of about 20 adult onlookers.Physical talents have not come easily to my oldest son, seven-year-old Ford. It has taken practice, prayer and good luck just to get him to first base. I’m not exaggerating when I say that in his first season of tee-ball, the only reason Ford ever made it to any base was through the other team’s errors. “I can’t believe he made it,” was a common sentiment from the stands.
But Ford never gave up, not even when he missed balls his younger brother, Owen, could catch, or when he tripped over air running to the base. At the beginning of this season, his second playing tee-ball, Ford petitioned the coach to let him play the infield. “Coach, I’ve been practicing real hard all summer,” he said. “If you just give me one shot at the infield, I think I can do it.” The coach put him at second base and has delighted with us in Ford’s determination and spirit ever since.
So you can imagine my shock when Ford was up at bat last night and the other team’s coach yelled to his players, “This one’s an easy out, guys.” He said it three more times: “Easy out, guys. Easy out.” That was bad enough, but even worse, ironically, was that Ford didn’t seem to hear it. No, he was smiling up at me and his dad in the stands. “Hey, look at me,” his eyes were saying. “Aren’t you proud of me? Watch me hit this ball, Mom and Dad!”
Let me stop here and remind you that this is tee-ball, not the major leagues, not even high-school baseball. I think yelling discouraging comments about any six- or seven-year-old kid learning a new sport and trying his best is similar to a kindergarten teacher who tells her class, “This kid is stupid! This kid can’t read!” Degrading remarks don’t belong on the ball field any more than they belong in the classroom. And yet they are frequently tolerated at the former even if not in the latter.
When I look back on this moment now, it’s as if everything was in slow motion. The coach’s words escaped from his mouth in one long, dreadful sound: “Eaaaasssyyyyy Ooooouuuut.” I could feel the part of me that doesn’t back down rising up. It’s the part of me that staged a sit-in at the Ford dealership when I was seven-months pregnant because the manager wouldn’t replace our Firestone tires. It’s the part of me that stood up to our homebuilder, even when he threatened me with his tractor, and later testified against him at his trial. It’s the part of me that perhaps should have been a lawyer or Bill O’Reilly’s intern.
After the game was over, I approached the other coach and asked to talk to him about what he had said. Ten minutes later, the coach was yelling at me, I was crying, and Dustin was pretending not to know me because he avoids confrontation at all costs.
I turned to one of the loudest mothers on our team for backup. If Dustin wouldn’t support me, I knew she would. Yet her expression was all “stinks to be you, Sarah.” Later she said, “I’m all talk, Sarah. I don’t usually confront people, and especially not people like that coach.”
Finally, I walked away from the coach because I realized there’s no reasoning with a grown man who delights in six- and seven-year-olds winning or losing at tee-ball as if it was the World Series. But there was still this little issue of my pride… and my toe-in-the-sand husband.
“I feel like I made a fool of myself,” I told Dustin once we were in the car.
“No, the coach made a fool of himself,” Dustin said.
“And why did you just stand there?” I asked.
“Because I knew you could handle it.”
Imagine that. My Navy pilot husband – the one trained for combat – says I can “handle it.”
Then a little voice came from the back of the car.
“I’m glad you stuck up for me, Mom,” Ford said. “But really, it’s OK. I heard what the coach said, but it didn’t bother me because I knew I would prove him wrong. I’m not an easy out.”
That makes two of us, Ford.
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Sarah Smiley is the wife of a Navy pilot and daughter of a retired Navy pilot. She is the author of “Going Overboard: The Misadventures of a Military Wife” (Penguin/NAL), and her syndicated column “Shore Duty” appears weekly in military and civilian newspapers across the country. Read more about Sarah at her website, www.sarahsmiley.com.
