We Can't Lose

I watch/read very little news, to the point where I am borderline ignorant.  Do trending videos count as news?  Didn't think so.  But in the past few hours one story made its way past my nonsense filters.  A lopsided high school football win is the subject of a bullying case.  Texas high school football is a pretty big deal.  Buzz Bissinger documented it, quite nicely, in his book Friday Night Lights.  Peter Berg made a pretty crappy movie about said movie.  Then NBC picked it up and created a revered show making you almost forget Berg's crappy movie.

As in most things, the truth is stranger than the fiction.  And truth is, sometimes one team is pretty darn good, and the opponent, not so much.  All accounts from this game suggest the winning coach called off the dogs when the rout was on.  He had his return men call fair catches.  He emptied his bench and played the second and third team all of the second half.

Most importantly, the losing coach saw nothing wrong with what happened, how the opposing team and coach and team handled their business, or the insane final score.  91-0 is a straight up beating.

But, this is 2013.  This is the age of bullying.   More specifically, its the age of bullying laws.

This is not to discount the reality of bullying and its sometimes brutal consequences.  In Florida for instance a young girl took her life and her online abusers were arrested.  Calling someone awful names, day in and day out, is wrong, plain and simple.

Putting two teams against one another and keeping score is called competitive athletics.  There should be a result: win, lose or tie.

Having been through my share of wins and defeats I can tell you this, they are both essential learning/teaching moments.  For the record, a loss by 1 point stings a whole lot more than 91.  Clearly the losing team was overmatched.  That should give them an incentive to do better, or perhaps give their school's athletic director some careful consideration before scheduling that opponent next year.  One loss does not define a season, or career.  How one responds to said loss can define a kid, and his or her character, for the rest of his or her life.

An angry parent decided to cry bully and take the winning team/coach to task about it.  The protest and attempt to convict the team only shone a light on a game this nation did NOT need to know about.  All around this great land this weekend teams will take a beating not unlike 91-0.  Coaches will do their best (in most cases) to stop the bleeding.

But we have to stop short of taking the effort out of the game at hand.  How do you tell a kid to ease up, or not try so hard?

Will that help the outcome?  What does it teach?

And if the opponent hears that their counterpart is not trying their hardest, how will that effect their (already fragile) psyche?

You win some, and yes, you lose some!!

There is no shame in defeat, only if you fail to learn anything from it.

Let's all understand the difference between losing and being bullied.  Please!!

It is the only way we can get better.  In sports, in politics, in life.

Which gets me back to why I stay away from the news in the first place.  It is, mostly,  a sea of negativity and a countless tally of our losses.

Can a brother get a feel good story???





And if the opponent hears that their counterpart is not trying their hardest, how will that effect their (already fragile) psyche?

You win some, and yes, you lose some!!

There is no shame in defeat, only if you fail to learn anything from it.

Let's all understand the difference between losing and being bullied.  Please!!

It is the only way we can get better.  In sports, in politics, in life.

Which gets me back to why I stay away from the news in the first place.  It is, mostly,  a sea of negativity and a countless tally of our losses.

Can a brother get a feel good story???

Party's Over

A deep melancholia hits me this afternoon.  It probably is rooted in my daughter being away for several weeks.  It is crazy how quiet a house can be without a 10 year old occupying it.  The weekends have been eerily wide open and frankly, odd.  Not that the time alone with my wife hasn't been amazing, it has.  But you forget, or more specifically don't realize, how much time and energy parenting occupies in your life.

But this was an important moment for the little one, and for her parents too.  4th grade presented a ton of social obstacles that neither she, nor we, were prepared to handle.  She needed to experience new things and meet new people.  Through a third party we are told she is enjoying "being herself."  "Whatever the hell that is" we asked.

Point is there were far too many hindrances and anxious moments navigating her schools' halls this year.

And as I look back one thing strikes me as the prime offender:  Birthday parties.

Don't get me wrong, we should all have some life affirming celebration time.  The day we were born is special and demands attention, even at (or especially!) our advanced ages.

How far should we be going at school age is another thing altogether.  Are parties that include entire classes and their siblings appropriate?  Probably not.  After all what message does it send that EVERYONE wants to know and admire you?  The wrong one undoubtably.  By the time you are working age most of us are lucky to have a handful of really close friends.

The same can be said for the intimate gathering, especially in the world of pre-teen girls.  If you invite 5 or 10 of your "besties" it is most certainly going to create tension.  Inevitably there are 1 or 2 girls who thought they were on the short list.  And telling your daughters to keep the party a secret is not a solution.  It still stings us that some school girls, fully aware our daughter was not included on an invite list, asked sarcastically what she had planned for the evening?  They 1) knew they were supposed to be discreet about the event and 2) knew our daughter was not on the list.  Essentially it provided fuel for malice.  Is that what the party was intended for?

Of course not.  So what then is the solution?  We cannot in good conscience put an end to birthday celebrations, right?

Or maybe we can.

Everyone knows middle school and/or adolescence can be quite challenging for kids.  These days it seems like it is far more complex than ever before.

With that this space is requesting birthday parties be discontinued from age 10 through age 15.

No more invites to a select few.  No more invites to the masses.

Nope.  From now on a simple "Happy Birthday" from peers and the shared acceptance that we are all grateful that he or she is alive and well.

However, we do not need to bowl with you, or ride ponies, or even eat cake to acknowledge the occassion.  It is far more important to co-exist and get along at an early age.  There is plenty of time to draw lines in the sand and exclude/include who we want to as we get older.

This was the first year our girl did not have a birthday party (big or small.)  There were mitigating factors, camp abroad chief amongst them.  My guess is when the dust settles and she looks back at the year that was this fact will not even register.

She is able to make plans with friends most any weekend.  She sees many of them during sports team practices and other shared events.

Moving forward she should have the flexibility to hang with jocks, or bookworms, or whomever.

Parties potentially disrupt social convention and seem more detrimental to the process.

Isn't adolescence hard enough?

Let the kids party all the time.  And act themselves, without our interference!

Social Darwinism need not include cake and balloons.  Let it happen organically with social media updates and cyber bullying.

Party people can have their cake and eat it too... alone.


* Apologies to bakers, party planners, and all those who make money on the massive events we call kids parties.  Find your money making opportunities elsewhere.  Perhaps we make parties for those 30-60 bigger events, since, after all, anyone over 30 these days could use a big party for making it this long.  You could argue the parties should be more vital as you age, not wasted on youth.  Sound like a massive justification?  Tough.