THE UNCOORDINATED!

If you were ever the uncoordinated kid in class, or the brainaic in Harry Potter thick glasses wearing a bookworm facade then you are very familiar with being the last one picked for sports. We short folks were never worth the selection when it came to basketball and might have never been on a team had the Little Sisters of Righteousness School not inspired that everyone must play. With a kind word, a bizarre hand held clicking device, and rulers that could make your knuckles feel like they had just been hit with basketball-sized hailstones in a Midwest summer storm, the sisters enforced equality at the end of a wooden gun. Still that feeling of being left out and unwanted were stigmas after such drama played out on the court. Silently we hid the scar tissue on the inside lest we be seen as sissy mommas boys or crybaby little girls.

With the ever aging baby boom generation coming into its glory, can I tell you that all I see are signs of crisis? The adult teams are being chosen around me and now the world doesn’t have Sister Mary Guilt-A-Lot to tame it. Many are about to be stung all over again. Being one of those baby boom mentioned types looking at big numbers of candles on my birthday cake I must say that aging is nothing like I thought it would be. Who would have thought that wearing diapers, eating pureed food and crying until someone comes to hold you would carry the same weight at both ends of your life? Actually I didn’t spend enough time thinking about what it would be like at all!

As Young Turks we all think of ourselves as invincible; boys profess this outright while girls seem merely to believe it. As we grow from our indestructible teen years and early twenties into our thirties, forties, fifties and beyond it becomes apparent that there are certain things we will no longer be able to enjoy completely. For guys, long distance whizzing is out of the question, and ladies need a medical device around their neck in case they get down on the toilet and can’t get up again!

Like the prepubescent geeky years, here comes the constant reminder that we are no longer worthy. Young girls in phone calls talking about whether the cute guy is going to be at the party tonight no longer includes you as the person they might be talking about. Second glances thrown your way from a good looking member of the opposite sex is one resembling a reaction more of horror than one of lust. No one is checking out your shape anymore unless they want a person to model their Humpty Dumpty costume for the community playhouse.

Amidst all of the missed opportunities of your life it seems like the ones you felt strongest about yet never achieved come haunting. Licking the whip cream off of the thigh high boot of a buxom blonde behind the bleachers of the soccer field is not going to include someone with as much gray hair as you. You’re more likely to be the one snapping photos of the pair under there but you’re also predictably going to be hauled off to the hoosegow to be charged with being a pervert. It’s all because no one ever warned you to live life beyond the fullest. They always told you to settle down and spend your life with that special someone. That is a great life I’ll admit it. However, when you come out on the other end of the aging tunnel you can see back to the beginning and the things that filled your loins with passion and vigor all belong to a younger generation.

There could be worse things in life than not being picked for the ball team unless it’s a toss up between you and Norvall the one armed, one eyed, paraplegic midget who talks with a lisp, and tends to drool allot. Still, as you age and the great creator in the sky starts calling the geriatric class home for his ball club, you might find that being picked last for that team is a lot like winning the lottery. You’ll get to see all of those contemporaries of yours who made your life so miserable go before you. You’ll get to witness more sunrise’s and sunsets, and who knows you might get lucky with Granny Gertrude in the old folks home that the kids put you in, if she happens to have narcolepsy and is partially blind. Perhaps she was never into sports and doesn’t mind that you pitch a baseball like a girl.

When you’re a hundred eight years old and your body acts like it at every turn creaking and offering new insights into the true meaning of the words ache and pain you might long to be chosen for that great gig in the sky. Many of us who fought for life never ending might find that being selected last still sucks as much as when you were a kid. Live large and ride a wild one as long and as often as you can before doing so causes you to bust a gut or fling your dentures across the room. You might poke someone’s eye out. Then they wouldn't want to pick you for their team!