Amy has started playing football.  When did my little girl go from sugar and spice to everything Butkus?  Next week she’ll be fourteen.  Next week she’ll be trying to knock some snarling homunculus on his ass.

It’s flag football, so there’s no tackling.  But there are helmets and pads and mouth guards and cleats and testosterone and, granted, the testosterone pumps mostly in the hypothalmi of the coaches, but jeepers.  Barbies are out this Christmas.

She’s the only girl on the team, with only a few in the league.  It was all her idea.  Her migration through sports has been inspiring; basketball being the first taste she had of that organized community phenomenon where the dreams of kids meet the hopes of parents, then moving to baseball, and now football.

Those of you who have followed this journal over the years know that she’s a hemiplegic epileptic, to put it right out there starkly, a stroke at birth having brought all the wonders of cerebral palsy to our lives.  It’s quite clear at this point that I am the one who gets the most crazy over this.  Yes, I know, I compare her against other kids.  Yes, I know she’s amazing and can do many things.  I know, I know.

And I know that other people don’t know, and I get to see them discover Amy’s situation on their own.  When this happens in the setting of competitive community sports the ride can get wild.  There are very often skid marks on the learning curve for some of the parents and on occasion I wonder why they’re on the trip at all.

Today, at the first game, some of the parents were at the whispering stage, the “what’s wrong with her?” stage.  This concern, in conjunction with the urge to win games, gives birth in the mind to questions of strategy.  This could get really interesting.

I see and hear so much.  Too much sometimes.  It can be hell.

And sometimes it can be wonderful.  Sometimes seeing Amy is exactly what a person needs.

It’s early in the season.  Still lots to see.

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