The People Vs. The Referee

 

Never have I felt the phrase "sticks and stones may break your bones but words could never hurt me" to be so untrue until tournament weekends like this. It seems like competition brings out worst in parents, and somehow, it's all my fault. 

Being a referee is something I quite enjoy, seeing the game from another perspective has always appealed to me. It isn't until these tournament weekends come along that it all just really gets to me. It's easy to yell at the ref as a parent, player, or coach, but it's a lot harder to be the ref and take it. Most of the time I can brush it off pretty easily, but there was something about today that let it all in. Maybe it was the sun burning through my sunscreen or the abnormal sarcastic comments from the coaches, or parents going out of their way to tell me that I'm a terrible referee and I make terrible calls, or maybe it was one coach passing on to another to be weary of the "shitty refs".

I feel like giving my shirt, badge, and whistle to the coaches and parents and telling them "here, you do it". I also feel like giving out my resume to get a little respect on the field and to assure them that a 17 year old girl, yes girl, does in fact know what she is doing, and did pass her referee test with a 93% and has indeed been reffing for six years and she is infact the head referee who has officiated up to the national level. The yelling, the badgering, and the condescension gets tiresome. 

Another point of frustrations comes from the weakness and the easiness to harass seen by spectating that comes with being a girl referee, as well as the lack of seriousness taken when I address parents and coaches. A boy referee of less skill and experience than I will get more respect 8 times out of ten for the mere fact that they are male. 

The worst part of the gig is the impact parents make when they specifically go out of their way to find you after a game and vent to you all of the ways "you suck" to accomplish what? The game is over, nothing can be changed, this is youth league, AND YOU WON. Take the win, and enjoy it. Don't roast the ref. I hope these parents think about what they are teaching their children. And I hope these parents realize that no one is perfect, even referees. 

It's a hard night when all is said and done and you can still hear the parents voices in your head. It's supposed to be about the game, not the referee. 

Chronicles of the Train

As I boarded the train this afternoon, a vehicle new to my travel, a wave of calmness washed over me as I settled into my seat for the next several hours. Perhaps because of my previous hours logged of travel I thought, or perhaps because of my traveling companion this time. 

The train was fairly empty and the giddiness set in, after all, we're on a train for the first time! The first few minutes were spent looking out the window as the world passed us by. It looked different, new somehow though it was the same places we passed that we've always seen. The first few hours were spent in comfortable silence- I finally got to reading Looking for Alaska (a book I'm enjoying tremendously and finding a hard time putting down to write this) and was traveling quite comfortably, and incredibly relaxed when the train chronicles began. 

We stopped at Santa Barbara and a flood of college students came in with laptops, college hoodies, and odd sparkly veils that look like they could be for a Halloween costume or a school project. Among the college students was a man (that looked to be homeless, but I am not to say as he did pay with a debit card for his ticket) carrying an out-of-tune guitar and a booming voice. We moved out of the station stop and perhaps half an hour in, my focus began to be pulled from my book as I noticed life bursting around me. 

A few rows in front of my a girl struggled through her algebra 1 problems and relentlessly asked the boy across the way from her questions about her math. The girl to the right of me fiddled with her sparkly veil and straightened out the stands that stretched to be no less than seven feet. The scruffy man with the guitar several rows behind me finally had it with the quiet and began talking, to whom? I think to anyone who would make conversation. 

As the train ride progressed the boy moved from his seat to the seat right next to the girl struggling with her math, who I had a sneaking suspicion wasn't actually struggling all that much *see mean girls for the proper way to go about this*. I began to tune out the girl to my right who had not stopped fiddling with her costume/project. And the loudest occurrence to be noted was the man who had now begun playing his out of tune guitar and singing easy rhymes like "I'm on a train, and I want to buy some cocaine" escalating to his version of Tina Turner's "Rolling" to the point of the train stewardess asking the man to politely quiet down for the rest of the people on the train to which he responded "but I don't like the quiet!" And finally got to talking about what I thought was the inevitable- government conspiracies.  

As I sat on the train in that moment, my traveling companion laughing endlessly beside me, it finally clicked what traveling was all about- the people. And oh how I enjoy seeing these people live so differently than myself. 

I liked this.

I wrote this, and I liked it. 

:

Unphotgraphable

The picture I did not take was of us, as we laid on the beach, taking in what was left of the evening sun. The waves lapped lazily on the shore infront of us. I looked at our feet, covered in small rocks and sand, toes squirming in pace with our giddy hearts. You inaudibly gasped as I moved my foot closer to yours, and the sun finally gave way and the night made for our new beginning. 

A Person

Over the past few months, since school has started, this reappearing question of "what is value?" Has been knocking at my door. 

The first instance was in my AP English class- we created blog for this course- on the first day of school my teacher said "these blogs give your name value." 

What? 

A blog gives my name value? And of all things a blog of my English homework gives my name value? I didn't understand. Would I even consider this very blog to give my name value? 

You have to think about it for a minute. I had to think about this for months. What gives me value? Is it a blog? Is it an award? Is it a talent? The question so ambiguous, a conclusion seems nearly impossible. 

Today I think I figured it out. You can't give yourself value. You can only recognize the value others see in you. And I can't quite spell it out neatly, because I'm not all to sure how this all clicked for me, but it did. 

Today, my seat partner in AP Econ, smiled and said "Bye Imanie." As I got up from my seat and walked toward the door. 

Today I realized how easily a person can give you value. And, today I realized what value really is. 

Looking at a a Bowl of Jelly Beans (and picking out the good ones)

I've decided that that people are like jelly beans. They're similarly shaped  and they may look the same on the outside but when you pick out a yellow one because you think it's lemon it could easily turn out to be popcorn. So like people, we could all look pretty similar from the outside, but it's the inside that counts. And I know it's an incredibly hackneyed phrase but it's an important one in life to always be reminded of. Lemon tastes a lot different than popcorn and while some people may be into popcorn, some aren't. It's easy to think you are picking the right shade of green from the outside, but if you don't break it open and get a little taste of it, you could be saving a booger for last all the while you think it's green apple and miss out on appreciating other flavors like cinnamon, or fruit punch. 

That Virtual Feeling

More and more I find myself extremely dissatisfied with social media sites. I pass time scrolling through them, all the way thinking of other more productive things I could be doing. I crave that physical contact. I crave the laughter shared amongst friends, the adventures, the conversations, the physical I'm actually here with you not just texting you or seeing a picture of you on Instagram. The internet isn't close enough, and I crave that closeness. I think we all do. 

Letter to that Editor

As I read the American way magazine and these gratuitous letters to the editor in a plethora of ways speaking to the genius of this idea because of the social media destroying all long depthful thought in the younger generation, I've found inspiration in the form of frustration.

 I write this letter to the editor, not to win the 100,000 miles of travel (although who wouldn't want to win that) but to speak for my own generation and the stereotypes that have taken their toll. Letter writing may be scarce, but it is not a lost art. It is practiced, perhaps in secret now, because of the lack of confidence in the younger generation being able to hold thoughts of substance. The most frustration only comes from the same use of social media and technology by the older generation. We all aren't lost to the to art of writing, we only exercise different forms of it, like spontaneous bursts of passion in 140 characters or less.