Oh, the things I can't do

"Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do." -John Wooden 

The hardest thing about coaching is that I don't know how. Not at all. All of my motivational leader-type experiences in which I get people to push themselves harder and do things they think they can't have followed this typical script:

Me: Hey, let's climb this giant rock! (Or jump out of this tree! Or run 10 miles! Or do 2000 crunches then 100 pushups then roll around in a big snowbank outside! Or hike 18 miles with really heavy backpacks and camp out and hike back tomorrow!)

Other person: Uh, I don't think I want to do that. I probably can't do that.

Me: You can! Let's do it! Look, I can do it! You know you want to! It will be fun! Yeah!

Other person: ...

Me: Come on! Let's go! I'll help you! Fun! Yeah!

Other person: ...

Me: (Same type of comments, relentlessly)

Other person: Okay. Let's do it.

Me: !!!! 

And later...

Other person: I didn't think I'd be able to do that. What an accomplishment! (Or that was really scary. But fun. I'm glad I tried it. Or wow, you're crazy. Clearly we have different interests. I'm staying home next time.)

Me: I knew it! If I can do it, you can do it!

Apologies to my childhood friends for all the assorted reckless things and bike wrecks, to my high school friends for all the building-climbing, and to my college friends for all the rollerblading and wrestling and climbing things. Safety first! (Ha ha ha.)

But now, it's like, hey, I can only do ten pushups before my face is really really hot. I know my limits. (Jeff, stop snickering.) I can skate a lot of laps but can't do any crunches. I do a million turnaround stops but no falls. And coaching isn't about that anyway. But how easy and effective it's always been to challenge people to do more than me or work harder than I am or somehow goad them into trying to beat me! (Caveat: not talking about overall roller derby here–not that conceited–just talking about sheer endurance and staying power.) 

But it's really difficult to try to adjust to having to just tell people what to do without putting forth that physical, visible challenge. And it's even more difficult to be friendly and encouraging since that's not my natural inclination in any circumstance. My default personality is certainly (unintentionally) standoffish and solitary. 

But I guess I have to forget about my strengths and work on my weaknesses, just like in every other situation. But in like 5 months, watch out–I can probably outdo you. And that's the plan.

Ruthlessly results-oriented

"All coaches have one thing in common, that they are ruthlessly results-oriented." -Fast Company magazine


When I was a senior in college, one of my professors asked me to guest-teach his business writing class full of international graduate students. I'd achieved a reputation for helping people write successful resumes and cover letters, so I guess this professor saw it as a good opportunity to give me some teaching experience and get a day off in the process.

So I go into this classroom armed with standard college-student-level examples, fairly confident that I could show this class how to tweak their resumes and make them look good. I was a little daunted––they were all older than me, and graduate students!––but I've always had ridiculous amounts of self-confidence, so no big deal.

And then I was bombarded by questions!
"I made three drafts of my resume. Which one is better? The one with education on top? Or experience? Or should I emphasize my goals?"

"I already have a job lined up when I go back to my country after graduation. Why should I learn this?"

"How old are you?" (Me: Hmm... I look pretty young. Please keep listening to me.)

"I have ten years of experience in [some complicated math or technology field]. Should I list all of my skills? That would make my resume at least ten pages instead of one. Can't I just do a CV instead?"

"I don't want to apply for any jobs that require English. It's difficult for me here, and I don't know English well. Can I just write a resume for my own country?"

And my favorite: "I'm fluent in four languages. Should I include that? I don't see that on any of your examples." "Oh, me, too. I speak three languages perfectly." "Yes, I do, too." Etc.

Wow. Overwhelming. Then I realized that I just needed to work with each person individually, from the ones who didn't know why they were in the class to the ones who had years of experience and far more expertise in some (most) areas than I did.

It's kind of the same coaching the DDG freshmeat right now. I have a plan, and I have a goal, but everyone is progressing so differently, and there are so many questions!

"How can I improve my crossovers?"

"What is the best way to do a turnaround stop without just spinning and falling down?"

"What kind of wheels should I get? What kind of trucks are on these skates? What are bearings and how do they work?"

"What kind of league job would be best for me? Who should I talk to about that?"

Some girls can immediately skate as well as some of our veterans, and some are on skates for the first time in decades or the first time ever. Some girls are confident in their past years of athletics and some are new to team sports. Some are much more outgoing, and some still seem uncertain by the whole rambunctious atmosphere.

And then my goals––to get everyone scrimmaging as quickly as possible and to be encouraging at all times––cannot be on a timeline. That's just impossible. At the beginning stage, it's like coaching nine people at, at least, five distinct skill/confidence levels.

But I am just so proud of each girl! And now I will embarrassingly talk about each of them:
Flossy Fatale has SO MUCH heart. If I had gotten a bruise the size she did at bootcamp, I would not have been back. Her enthusiasm level is ridiculous. Taking a beating from the floor and getting back up every time––quicker than the last time––very impressive.

JJ, jumping over stuff at, like, her third or fourth practice, without fear, seems to just do what needs to be done. Her focus seems strong. I don't know her goals, but I can tell she has them and will relentlessly achieve them.

Jill, at the greenway practice, really stole my heart when she said, "Oh, we're done with these exercises already? Can we do some situps? Come on, guys, we need to do some situps." And later, "Are we done skating? Let's run now. At least for a few minutes. We all need to run!" And, "Wow, when I fell, I realized that I really love falling! Even on asphalt."

Honey is back after a few years off. It seems like when people leave they don't come back. But she's here, and she's ready to skate. She has just jumped back in as though she knows derby is where she wants to be, which, of course, it is!

Christina (I apologize for this) really reminds me of me. It seems like she's like, Okay, I'm ready to hit some people. I've been waiting for roller derby, and now I'm here. Let's get going. I don't need encouragement, just permission to keep pushing it to the limit.

Tonya is another girl with more heart and enthusiasm than I can imagine. She skates ALL the time! With a broken butt and everything. There's something unnameable about her that tells me she's going to be awesome for the duration, that she's going to completely immerse herself in derby and become increasingly better and better.

DISPATCHher, hmm. I am a little afraid of scrimmaging against her once I'm back. She practiced taking hits one time, and there hasn't been another girl with such solid skating skills since... I don't know. And I know she's going to hit like Nookie or Ebbin or Lola. So watch out!

Boom Boom sort of infuriates me with jealousy at her current level of athleticism. (I was out-wall-sat! I know! Crazy! I'll blame it on the baby.) She approaches every skill with a sort of nonchalance, like, Yeah, I can do this. No problem. I might not have it yet, but in a few more tries, it's going to be perfect, and I'm going to make it look easy. As though I've done this my whole life.

And Vixen'Ta Jett is there. She's really there. From the first day she walked in to practice, right before we took time off at the end of last season, to every practice now, it seems like she switches 100% from real life to derby. That's so important, and it shows so much in her skills and progress.

I can't imagine DDG without any of these girls, already. And while I feel like I'm looking in nine different directions at nine completely different types of skaters and personalities and skill levels and communication types, I know that they will all come together to make our team stronger and better than ever. As long as we all have our goals and keep our focus securely on them, we're ready to roll!

Instinct and crazy Walmart people

I almost got jumped in the Walmart parking lot.

When I got out of the car, this lady was running at me, yelling something like, "You KNOW what you did! I can't believe you're such a [edited]! You took my parking spot!!"

Me, looking around at the kazillions of empty spots, some closer to the door: "?"

Crazy lady: "And I have kids in the car!"

Thinking, Poor kids. At least I'm guaranteed to be a better mom than someone. Thinking, Wow, you're a psycho. And your hair is ugly. I should say something really mean. I don't deserve this. Me, politely: "Would you like me to move?"

Crazy lady: "Uh." Deflated pause. Looking disappointed that the pregnant lady didn't want to fight with her, or even yell. "No. It's too late now. Never mind."

She got back in the minivan and parked one spot away. I kept walking. (Well, I noted the license plate in case she keyed the car while I was inside. Gold Odyssey, Alabama plates, 44C80F5.) Walking inside, I was trying to calm down. I'm sure I looked like the calmest person in the world, but I was pretty shaken. I hadn't even seen her van in the parking lot, much less cut her off, and that made the shock so much worse. Being blindsided makes it so hard to do the right thing instead of the instinctual thing.

It made me think of this other time, when I was about 20 maybe, when the mom of a guy I had dated asked me to visit him while I was visiting the town he lived in. She suspected he was taking drugs and apparently thought he would stop if I just stopped in and chatted for a while. I hadn't seen him in months, so I humored his mom and stopped at his apartment. He answered the door and seemed happy to see me. Then this tiny little screechy girl darted from across the room and started trying to hit me. I was pretty startled, and I laughed - she was about 5 feet tall and pretty skinny - because it seemed ludicrous that she was physically attacking me. Apparently laughing at a person isn't always the best move. I wanted to punch her, but she was so small and she was obviously on drugs and out of it. And, you know, I didn't really know her or know why she was hitting me. I covered my face with my forearms and got a nasty scratch down one arm.

I was angry, but the worst part was knowing I did the right thing and it still being so difficult. It would have been much more satisfying to hit her back. For weeks, it made me angry all over again every time people asked me why I didn't do anything back - it would have been justified, being self-defense and all. Having people imply I was weak or cowardly for not following my instincts was certainly the hardest part.

Then there was this one rugby game where this same girl kept illegally tackling me. Then, one of her teammates took me down, she looked me in the eye, and deliberately cleated me in the crotch. I may have punched her in the face. It wasn't more satisfying.

When I joined Dixie Derby Girls, my sense of the team was mainly confusion and chaos. Some people were friendly. Most people were indifferent. Some seemed actually mean. (I blame this impression on my natural reticence, though.) Practices were confusing, and I couldn't figure out who the coach was for months. It seemed like a lot of time was spent talking about things like, This person said this, and then this other girl got all mad. And now I'm going to get back at her for doing this one bad thing to this other girl, because she's my friend. It seemed like I spent a lot of time standing or skating aimlessly, invisible, listening to all kinds of people say all kinds of things. Mainly, it didn't seem malicious, just habitual. And when we scrimmaged, there was one player who, because of her height and unsteady skating gait, seemed to always elbow me in the face. It was hard to not take it personally.

DDG's a whole new team now, but it's still difficult to do the right thing instead of the instinctual thing. When I hear someone say something terrible about people I like - or when I was still practicing and felt like someone was targeting me (which, really, is almost always in the mind of the person who feels targeted, I think) - it's hard to not turn around and do the same back instead of addressing it calmly.

But, you know, I don't want to be that crazy lady looking for a fight in the Walmart parking lot. I don't want DDG to be that team that allows itself to be baited, to lose tempers, and to lose games because of it. I certainly don't want to be that girl who punches someone during a sporting event for no reason. (That's not entertainment, really. That's lack of self-control and respect for the game.) It's difficult to wait half a second and do the right thing and second-guess constantly about it for weeks afterward, but it's worth it.

Whoa! Determination!

Winston Churchill said, "Success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts." I don't know what he was talking about, but it's also true in roller derby.


This last Wednesday, the team was doing some hip-whipping drills. This is when everyone skates in a line fairly close together and the person at the back of the line weaves through, propelling herself by pulling really hard on people's hips. When done correctly, the person weaving through will pull hard enough to almost make the other girl stop.


So imagine this is your, oh, maybe fourth derby practice ever. Or maybe it's your third practice since getting injured early in the fall, and you hadn't been skating very long then. Now imagine you're concentrating on keeping up with girls who've been playing for four or five years and you're thinking about skating fast enough, crossing over, looking behind you, and suddenly someone skates up and jerks on your hips nearly as hard as she can. And then you're on the ground. And then you're getting yelled at to get up, catch up, get back in line, stay an arm's length apart, cross over, skate faster, look back... next girl comes up, you're on the ground. Then do it again! 


It nearly brought tears to my eyes to see these girls keep getting up, keep catching up, keep getting better, and just plain keep going. And the frustration and determination! None of them complained a single word. None of them quit. And they'll all be back.


If I had joined an already established team, gone to practice a few times, and gotten pulled to the floor repeatedly, I probably would have been like, "Pshw. I'm outta here. I'm not coming back for this agony. No way I'll ever make it to being the one knocking people over."


But really, I just can't believe these girls. They want to play so badly. This is how it should be.

Homesickness for the place you're in

This season can, for me, be summarized by a feeling of homesickness. Every year until grad school, I moved back and forth from Vermont to Yellowstone, throwing in a couple seasons in Wisconsin and Minnesota every once in a while. And the weirdest thing was feeling homesick for the place I was at! In Yellowstone, people move a lot - it's just the nature of the Park Service. When my friend Alexis's family (my true second family) moved to Alaska but I was still back in Yellowstone the next summer, I had a vague feeling of homesickness the whole season.

That's how I felt with the Dixie Derby Girls this whole year.  I was there the whole time, but so many things were missing, or I was missing so many things.

Chronological recap
March 6 at Big Easy: Missed signing up for this game after mistakenly thinking it was for the newest girls only
March 19 home scrimmage v. Vette City: Busted my knee on the first jam when my kneepad slid off. The first jam! Hobbled around for weeks with a giant fluidy lump and felt sorry for myself. Bought better kneepads.
March 27 at OK City: See above. Still couldn't walk well. Probably cried during game time while I was sitting at home still feeling sorry for myself.
April 10 at Biloxi: Best game ever! Woohoo! Hit better than I ever have during the second half, thanks to a few words from Snidely saying to stop listening to the coaches and just do what needs to be done (sorry, coaches).
April 17 home v. Panama City: Home season opener. Blowout. I felt bad for the other team playing so poorly. No fun to watch and hardly fun to play.
May 1 at Houston: Dad visiting from Vermont. Stayed home.
May 15 home v. Hard Knox: Played in this game but don't remember it. Could have been the one with all the drama on the bench that I tried to not to remember (and succeeded)?
June 12-13 at No Coast and Green Country: After nearly a year of unemployment, got a job. Not able to take time off for days and days of endless driving briefly punctuated by bouts.
June 19 home v. Big Easy: Out of town for a wedding. Back in time to watch the last part of the second game.
July 17-18, Rocket City Rumble: Game v. Tampa. Ugh. We got killed. I didn't get to play much. But when they did put me in, I scored a bunch of points (comparatively speaking, since collectively we certainly didn't score a bunch of points, maybe like 20).
Game v. Memphis. Lots of miscommunication on the bench. Pretty happy with my semi-effective and comparatively penalty-free performance. (Again, comparatively speaking, since, like, half our team was ejected). Emotionally, the beginning of the end.
August 28 home v. Tallahassee: Played well. Had fun. Sad we lost.
August 28 home v. mixed team: Played well. Had fun. Sad the other team wasn't more competitive. Loved skating with the new girls!
September 11-12 at Panama City and Tallahassee: Drove to Minnesota for a wedding and to see relatives.
October 23 at Chattanooga: Pregnant. Found out a week earlier. Had a feeling about it and briefly considered not peeing on the stick for another week so I could still play. Somehow, responsible part of brain won out. Too exhausted to even go watch, anyway.

Emotional recap
So pumped about new season!
So disappointed about stupid injuries.
So happy to have a derby wife! Bettie PageTurner! Triple yay! (I know, an unsocial person like me...?)
So happy about Sky Pi joining derby and becoming awesome! Yay, Lutherans!
So sad about lots of things. Teammates say terrible things to other teammates that can't be undone, and the people saying the terrible things wouldn't unsay them even if they could. As Code of Conduct committee chair, I got to hear all of it. It was so difficult. It's still so difficult. (Imagine how you felt in middle school when people slighted you. Now imagine that in a real-life situation but with people that you actually care about. You know, unlike your former classmates whose names you probably can't even remember.)
So happy about Sindy Sawblade joining derby and becoming awesome! Yay, more Lutherans! (Ha ha.)
So sad about more terrible things being said. We can handle the sticks and stones, but the words hurt so much more. And they're not even intended for me.
So happy about baby! Yay! Baby! (Many fears that this kid will be like me. Many prayers that he or she will be inclined toward Jeff's temperament. The lyrics of Brad Paisley's "Anything Like Me" kind of haunts me. See previous post for details.)
So sad about not playing next season.
But so happy about coaching freshmeat! Woohoo!

And that's my official recap for the season. It might seem like I abandoned this blog, but really I've been deciding (for months, whew!) whether to stay with DDG, which is like home but also like so much homesickness. People always say that home is supposed to be a place of happiness and coziness and all good feelings all the time, but DDG and this past season, I think, are more like Kathleen Norris's vision: "Home ought to be our clearinghouse, the place from which we go forth lessoned and disciplined, and ready for life." I'll be in the same place this year but it will be a whole different feeling.

"Roller derby is too dangerous!"

Age 14. Where am I in this picture? Hint: Right next to Aaron Mutchie.

Age 17. Jumped off the back of this Bronco while it was moving. My tough-guy friends laughed.
Then they were sickened by all the blood and wouldn't help me wipe it off. (I know, Mom, I said I just fell on the gravel. I know you didn't believe me, but I didn't want you to worry.)

Age 18. Climbed into this closet and was stuck about 15 minutes while my friends pointed and laughed. Much photo evidence of this nature - climbing into small spaces and getting stuck.

Age 19. I used to ride my bike a lot. My favorite was riding over rocks and sticks and curbs and slanted surfaces to see how much air I could get. (This, with like a $10 yard sale bike.) A little too ambitious this day, but I did ride another 3 miles or so back into town after busting my face.

Ages 16, 18, and 20. Ran marathons.

Age 20. Swam across this river to climb into a cave on the other side, in March, while camping. It had snowed the night before.

Age 21. Climbed cell phone tower in winter in Minnesota without gloves.

Now, someone tell me that roller derby is too dangerous and that I'm going to seriously hurt myself. I'll take that (much more) calculated risk.

Roller derby riddle

What do these things have in common?

songs
Vienna by Billy Joel
I Wanna Go Too Far by Trisha Yearwood
I Take My Chances by Mary Chapin Carpenter

poem
Swearing, Smoking, Drinking by Susan Browne

novel
We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson