Well, I did it again. I swore that I wouldn’t do this once I started the blog and lo and behold... I find myself posting my first entry in nearly 4 months.
It certainly isn’t because I’ve had a lack of things to talk about. There’s been Ugandan bill writers who want to kill homosexuals, my first driving experience in Downtown Toronto, celebrity train wrecks and the sick desire of the public to watch, my need to torture myself through weekly bowling, proper parental etiquette in watching basketball games and dance recitals, sitting by while a loved one is in a war zone and perhaps the most cliché of topics to write about, turning 40.
While I could bore you to death with some sort of inner turmoil and conflict that I am dealing with by reaching the milestone, it would be a fabrication. Sure in brief moments of boredom and loneliness, I found myself wallowing; thinking about 40 years that have not worked out as happily as I hoped. However, it is really true that 40 is just a number and really nothing has changed. I am still the same guy with the weird sense of humour and the heart on his sleeve that I always was. So what’s the big deal?
So instead I want to just share a note of pride that I have in some young men I have had the honour of coaching for the past few months in a brief Jr. High basketball season.
When I started coaching to help out a friend over 5 years ago, I did so as a favour and because I loved the sport and I wanted to share that love.
Over the years I have had teams of different skill levels who had varying levels of success in the sport, and this year was looking to be a difficult one. There was just one grade 9 boy on the team, less than 10 players total and most of them with very little experience.
The one thing they did have was desire and effort. This sounds really corny, but all season long these young men gave effort at every practice, in every drill. There was simply no quit.
In our final game of the year, after being down for 3 quarters, that desire and effort showed itself and the boys fashioned a come from behind win with a last seconds basket.
I realize that something as small as this is going to be forgotten by these young men and that in the grand scheme of things the small trophy they won for the consolation final of the Divisional Championship is nothing special.
What I also know though is that these young men displayed the type of characteristics that will serve them for the rest of their lives. They showed desire; heart; determination and effort in the face of difficulty. Sure I showed them how to do proper lay-ups, box out and rebound and how to set screens, but it was the more personal development skills that I hoped would come through... and it did with flying colors.
If I had even the smallest influence in bringing out those attributes in them... then it was mission accomplished.
Congratulations St. Mary Sharks... and thanks for the great season!
As for the complete and total lack of consistency shown to this blog... I apologize. It’s my hope to prove this will not be another project that fails to hold my commitment.
So stay with me... and don’t judge this Judge too harshly.
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