One of the guys on my co-ed softball team is a nut. He'll talk about anything and everything, and joke about all of it.
Another of the women on my co-ed team also plays on my women's only sports-team. We were talking about aspects of our season, and he wondered if he could play.
"Umm...you'd need to get some work done."
"Huh?"
"They only allow women."
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
Bowling
It has been years since I last went bowling, and even longer since I used my own ball to bowl. I had to dig it out of the patio storage area. I coudn't remember if I still had the blue one or the red one, nor how my shoes looked. OK, yes, I used to bowl...in a league...and had my own shoes...and ball. My parents bowled when I was a kid, and I got involved with it sometime in 7th or 8th grade, I think. My average gradually increased from the 120's up to the upper 180's as an adult. The highest game I ever rolled was a 243, which isn't too bad for a straight ball bowler. Yup, no spin. Well, if there was spin, it didn't do much to move the ball at all.
So, a friend sent me a recent invite to go bowling with a group of mainly lesbian women. I figured it would be fun to get out on the lanes again. After finding my bowling bag in the storage unit, I checked to see how it looked. It was the blue one (ahh yes, trying to be the man by switching from my red one to a blue one), and it felt a lot heavier than it used to be. Wow, it felt heavy. My first ball was a 12 pounder before I graduated to the 14 pounder sometime in my 20's. I never made it to the standard 16 pounder. The finger holes also felt a little bigger than before, but who knows for what reason.
Anyway, off I went to the bowling alley. My first game was a 167 I think. My second was a 201. My bowling mates were quite impressed, and continued to raz me whenever I missed a shot. Soon, they began rooting against me...in a friendly sort of way.
One of them checked out my ball, and noticed that the spacing was really big. "Wow...your finger spacing is huge. How do you hold the ball." The obvious answer is because I have male hands, but I just shrugged and said I like it that way.
So, a friend sent me a recent invite to go bowling with a group of mainly lesbian women. I figured it would be fun to get out on the lanes again. After finding my bowling bag in the storage unit, I checked to see how it looked. It was the blue one (ahh yes, trying to be the man by switching from my red one to a blue one), and it felt a lot heavier than it used to be. Wow, it felt heavy. My first ball was a 12 pounder before I graduated to the 14 pounder sometime in my 20's. I never made it to the standard 16 pounder. The finger holes also felt a little bigger than before, but who knows for what reason.
Anyway, off I went to the bowling alley. My first game was a 167 I think. My second was a 201. My bowling mates were quite impressed, and continued to raz me whenever I missed a shot. Soon, they began rooting against me...in a friendly sort of way.
One of them checked out my ball, and noticed that the spacing was really big. "Wow...your finger spacing is huge. How do you hold the ball." The obvious answer is because I have male hands, but I just shrugged and said I like it that way.
Monday, August 21, 2006
A lot to write about
OK, OK....yeah, I haven't written in like 18 days. Wow. Where has the time gone?
I'm on my lunch break now, so I don't have time to write about all of it, but some of the topics include my creative writing class discussion from last week, the JonBenet case, a conversation after my softball game yesterday, and a few other items.
So, last week was the first meeting for my writing class. I arrived slightly early, with about half of the class already chatting with the instructor about our backgrounds. One of the last guys to enter was definitely gay. I don't know what it was about him...the saunter, the 80's style clothes, or what...but he was definitely gay. Ding, ding, ding went the gaydar.
Over the course of the next hour or so, we chatted about stories...movies...you name it. Brokeback Mountain was mentioned, by the gay guy, I believe. He said he didn't particularly care for the movie...but discussed his reasons why it didn't win Best Picture. After that, he asks, "What did you think about...."
Somehow, right before he said the movie name, I knew what he was going to say. I'm not sure if it was the tone or what....but I knew. He wanted to know what she thought about Transamerica. Our instructor had seen it and said she loved the movie. So did the gay guy. I didn't think it was that great, although Felicity did a very good job acting in it. I wanted to pop up and say, "I wonder if you didn't like Brokeback for the same reason I didn't care for Transamerica"...but I didn't. I wanted to tell the teacher that perhaps so many people that saw it seemed to like it because they had never seen something like this before...but I didn't.
I just didn't think Transamerica was that realistic in many aspects of transition, but since neither of them could relate to that part of it, they had no idea what type of inaccuracies were propogated in the film. Sure, there were a lot of facts, but numerous realistic items were sidestepped in order to allow the premise of the movie to propogate. I'm sure the same can be said for parts of Brokeback...but I haven't seen the film yet.
OK, that's it for now...more later.
I'm on my lunch break now, so I don't have time to write about all of it, but some of the topics include my creative writing class discussion from last week, the JonBenet case, a conversation after my softball game yesterday, and a few other items.
So, last week was the first meeting for my writing class. I arrived slightly early, with about half of the class already chatting with the instructor about our backgrounds. One of the last guys to enter was definitely gay. I don't know what it was about him...the saunter, the 80's style clothes, or what...but he was definitely gay. Ding, ding, ding went the gaydar.
Over the course of the next hour or so, we chatted about stories...movies...you name it. Brokeback Mountain was mentioned, by the gay guy, I believe. He said he didn't particularly care for the movie...but discussed his reasons why it didn't win Best Picture. After that, he asks, "What did you think about...."
Somehow, right before he said the movie name, I knew what he was going to say. I'm not sure if it was the tone or what....but I knew. He wanted to know what she thought about Transamerica. Our instructor had seen it and said she loved the movie. So did the gay guy. I didn't think it was that great, although Felicity did a very good job acting in it. I wanted to pop up and say, "I wonder if you didn't like Brokeback for the same reason I didn't care for Transamerica"...but I didn't. I wanted to tell the teacher that perhaps so many people that saw it seemed to like it because they had never seen something like this before...but I didn't.
I just didn't think Transamerica was that realistic in many aspects of transition, but since neither of them could relate to that part of it, they had no idea what type of inaccuracies were propogated in the film. Sure, there were a lot of facts, but numerous realistic items were sidestepped in order to allow the premise of the movie to propogate. I'm sure the same can be said for parts of Brokeback...but I haven't seen the film yet.
OK, that's it for now...more later.
Thursday, August 03, 2006
Whoops
The ball came in low and inside. It's called the perfect pitch to crank since one has full velocity and the optimum angle at which to hit the ball. I really wanted to just hit a liner down the line, but I connected well. Too well. Let's just say that I hit it far. Very far. Further than most women my size would be able to.
I never intended to play like that. I simply wanted to come out, play some ball with friends, and have a good time. I wanted to exist as simply me and not have to worry about the whole gender thing. Most of the games I have played have been a little drive from where I live, but this is a new league I was invited to play in...that is closer to both home and work.
So, although the hit may have been attention I'd rather not have, seeing a coworker (who knows my situation) playing in the game before ours may have been a bigger problem. He knew me before and now after...even though we only chat once in a while. I deal with him mainly on a professional basis, but we have chatted. He seems pretty cool with my transition.
But...I wonder, since he is on a different team, will he leak my 411? Will my teammates find out? Will that knowledge change how they think of me? I seriously didn't plan to hit it as far as I did, but it happened. I have friends that can almost hit it as far, but they are slightly bigger than me.
Again, my justification for playing women's or co-ed sports is this: Should a 6'3" woman be prevented from playing professional basketball simply because she is 10" taller than the average women's height? Should I be discriminated against any differently?
(EDIT) I suppose part of my concern comes from the same issue Michelle Dumaresq has recently faced. She won the Canadian downhill championships, but the second place woman wore a shirt on the winner's platform that said, "100 Per Cent Pure Woman Champ". Michelle posted on a forum I was on, that she did experience a lot of bias from her fellow athletes. Once people know, they totally treat you differently. Yes, I have a similar past as Michelle, in that we both grew up as boys and participated in sports. We're athletic. So, I suppose we are guilty of having that privileged history where playing sports was expected of us more so than being an exception. Life's not fair though. Growing up, I was typically the smallest boy in most any sport I did. As a senior in high school, I wrestled at 119 pounds (54 kgs). Whenever I played basketball, I learned to shoot from the outside parameter because any shot I took inside the 3 point arch was typically blocked. I never went out for football because I thought I was too small...and I enjoyed cross country much better. Volleyball, and any similar sport, was hampered by my lack of height. Let's face it, the taller one is, the more power one can generate. It's not to say that a 5'5" man can't compete with the bigger boys, but it's damn hard. I can only think of three...two in basketball and one in baseball...who ever played professionally.(EDIT)
Anyway, I probably had the game of my life. I went 5 for 5 in my first 5 at-bats. When I came up to bat a sixth time, the bases were loaded with 2 outs and we were already up by more than 15 runs. The game was basically over. The scorekeeper, who'd noticed my stats for the game, wanted me to crank on one again.
I didn't. I grounded out to the short-stop.
I never intended to play like that. I simply wanted to come out, play some ball with friends, and have a good time. I wanted to exist as simply me and not have to worry about the whole gender thing. Most of the games I have played have been a little drive from where I live, but this is a new league I was invited to play in...that is closer to both home and work.
So, although the hit may have been attention I'd rather not have, seeing a coworker (who knows my situation) playing in the game before ours may have been a bigger problem. He knew me before and now after...even though we only chat once in a while. I deal with him mainly on a professional basis, but we have chatted. He seems pretty cool with my transition.
But...I wonder, since he is on a different team, will he leak my 411? Will my teammates find out? Will that knowledge change how they think of me? I seriously didn't plan to hit it as far as I did, but it happened. I have friends that can almost hit it as far, but they are slightly bigger than me.
Again, my justification for playing women's or co-ed sports is this: Should a 6'3" woman be prevented from playing professional basketball simply because she is 10" taller than the average women's height? Should I be discriminated against any differently?
(EDIT) I suppose part of my concern comes from the same issue Michelle Dumaresq has recently faced. She won the Canadian downhill championships, but the second place woman wore a shirt on the winner's platform that said, "100 Per Cent Pure Woman Champ". Michelle posted on a forum I was on, that she did experience a lot of bias from her fellow athletes. Once people know, they totally treat you differently. Yes, I have a similar past as Michelle, in that we both grew up as boys and participated in sports. We're athletic. So, I suppose we are guilty of having that privileged history where playing sports was expected of us more so than being an exception. Life's not fair though. Growing up, I was typically the smallest boy in most any sport I did. As a senior in high school, I wrestled at 119 pounds (54 kgs). Whenever I played basketball, I learned to shoot from the outside parameter because any shot I took inside the 3 point arch was typically blocked. I never went out for football because I thought I was too small...and I enjoyed cross country much better. Volleyball, and any similar sport, was hampered by my lack of height. Let's face it, the taller one is, the more power one can generate. It's not to say that a 5'5" man can't compete with the bigger boys, but it's damn hard. I can only think of three...two in basketball and one in baseball...who ever played professionally.(EDIT)
Anyway, I probably had the game of my life. I went 5 for 5 in my first 5 at-bats. When I came up to bat a sixth time, the bases were loaded with 2 outs and we were already up by more than 15 runs. The game was basically over. The scorekeeper, who'd noticed my stats for the game, wanted me to crank on one again.
I didn't. I grounded out to the short-stop.
Tuesday, August 01, 2006
emails
Someone sent me a message on 7/3, and I waited too long to respond. My AOL software ate the email yesterday. I think her name was Zoe. Zoe, if you read this, please send me a note. Sorry.
Kara
Kara
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