Football Sunday sometimes Saturday...

It's not always about the score for me. Dressed in their tight pants and numbered jerseys, they skip into the arena, knees pumping, leg muscles flexed and ready for their job. It is a job after all. We tend to forget maybe because they are named "players" that they are actually there to earn a paycheck and do a job. Granted, it's a job like no other requiring a hard fit body, speed, agility and balance along with a quick mind, football players are super athletes.

I watch as the receiver of the ball, eyes trained on the prize thrown high into the air by the quarterback, reaches up to pluck it out of the air. BAM! He is hit by a tackle running at top speed, clipping him beneath the knees and taking his legs out from under him. That same receiver, after taking this hit cartwheels up to a standing position and walks away.

My head would still be ringing, my legs unable to support my body and I wouldn't get up to go through this again. It's the physical shape of these players that earn my admiration. Whether they win or lose the game watching these athletes doing their jobs is impressive.

So many hits and so many get up and go on. I'm saddened to see one of these warriors get taken down and unable to get back up or if they do stand to be escorted off the field with a knee injury or a shoulder injury that will end their careers in a matter of a few minutes on a play. When they prance into that arena, they face the fact that it might be their last game. That takes some fortitude.

We take offense to some of their off the field indiscretions. I'm one of those that is quick to be critical of these well paid men that squander their talents by becoming involved in fights, wife beatings or even murder. Are they just human or do they think they are above the law when they walk on the other side of the law?

Granted, many of them are family oriented but as with fame and fortune comes temptations and their own expectations for  allowances for their actions.

I can admire their abilities and still be critical of some of their behavioral antics.

That was yesterday. Today I'm painting T-shirts with Carrie. I promised her I would be at the school this morning to help her teacher with the students. Carrie hasn't had a great weekend. A low grade fever, coughing and a drippy nose contributed to a crappy night of rest. She doesn't complain but her face belies her health. Her eyes are mere slits; she looks like she needs to slip beneath the sheets and sleep for hours and hours. She won't admit to feeling sick. She wants to play.

We met at the school and sat around that dang table that is less then two feet off the floor. The little chairs are miniature in size to slip easily beneath the table. Shirts that have been dyed a tan buckskin color, sliced in fringes along the hem and the sleeves to look at though an Native American might be seen wearing it, is our project.  The theme of the t-shirt painting is "signs" as language. Sheets of paper with herioglyphics of the American Indian kind were spread out on each table. Little pots of paints, brushes and cups of water were centered above each child's station.

The adults that gathered there to help were in charge of the drawings. Each child selected the signs they wanted from the sheets of paper while the parents drew those signs on the t-shirts. The children would then pick up their paint brushes and outline the signs drawn on the shirts. The children had been instructed by the teacher before we got there to always rinse off their brushes after changing colors and dry them off before dipping into a new color.

I heard little voices from around the room raise in alarm when the rinse water in their cups changed from clear to the color they were rinsing from the brushes. The teacher assured them this was to be expected. They had been schooled well in what to do and anything out of the ordinary had to be justified to them.

I watched and listened as 21 small children sat in this classroom intent on their assignments. They would look for praise on their projects and I was quick to tell them their shirts were beautiful. I kinda  enjoy hangin out with them for these little exercises.

The little boy sitting beside me was a broad shouldered fellow, 5 yrs old with sandy hair that was pin straight and worn in a long buzz cut. It haloed his head and I could imagine 12 years from now him being dressed in helmet and shoulder pads charging down the field chasing a football. I looked around the room and tried to imagine what each one of these little persons would be doing 12 years from now. I have been able to follow some of the older grandchildren's friends as they have moved along through school and beyond on their own paths.

Carrie was bundled up and taken home to be medicated with some benadyrl and put to bed. She has the remainder of the week to be a student.

I'm off to enjoy the outdoors. We have some hair frizzin humidity. I watch the television reports of the blizzards in Colorado and I'm grateful for the warmth we have here and the nice dry roads. I don't want to ever fight those icy, snow roads and the winds of the winter west!