Flying Balls

Can you tell which one is me? Answer at the bottom of the post.

I was never a coordinated child. When we did athletic benchmarks, I scored so low on "how far can you throw a cricket ball" that the distance was less than the minimum on the scoring charts. This was because I was so nervous that I let go of it too late, and threw it straight at the ground instead of an arcing trajectory. Mrs Roberts didn't let me have a second try. Although I was not good at any sport, those involving balls were particularly challenging.

At St Marys Baldslow, which I attended from age 11 to 16, the winter sport was lacrosse. I have no idea why, as hardly any other schools in the area played it. I guess the athletic staff didn't care for hockey. Anyway, one week I was placed in goal. It was a terrifying experience, being the target of a fast-moving, head-height, hard leather ball and some subconscious survival instinct kicked in enabling me to save 5 out of 7 attempts at goal. This impressive performance earned me a place on the school team, where I spectacularly failed to ever save another goal.

When I moved to Kelly College for my last two years, I was happy that lacrosse was not on the schedule. Instead, the girls played hockey. I knew nothing of how to play hockey, and of course everyone else had grown up with it and was well acquainted with the rules. Mr Kirwin, our coach, asked me what I'd played before, and what position... uh oh. You guessed it, I ended up in goal again. And what a disaster that was.

Let me explain. I have trouble with rules for team sports. I know most people find it hard to understand the offside rule. All rules are like that for me. I can't relate the words to what I see happening in front of me. At one point, Janet, the team captain, told me to "let it go, let it go" as the ball was headed for me. I blocked the ball anyway, but it turned out there was something about the way it was hit that meant it wouldn't have counted as a goal, and letting it cross the line would have given us a corner. So after that, my mind was set on trying not to make that mistake again, and I neatly side-stepped the next few balls, giving our opponents very easy goals indeed!

The photo above shows me during my very brief time on the school team, at about sixteen years old. (I'm in the back row, far right. My best friend at the time, Maggie is at the far left of the back row, with Debbie next to her. Everyone else is from the year above me.) That was the last time I was on a team for any sport. And I'm quite happy for it to stay that way.