Trash talk

Sometimes at practice we talk about trash talk––how to not let it bother us, the appropriate ways to say things back (not with profanity the refs can hear), that sort of thing.

I've always found trash talk ridiculous. Especially during games. Some girl is in my face telling me she's going to take me down? I usually giggle. Because she probably will take me down at some point, but I'm going to take her down more, and harder, and laugh while doing it, and get back up a lot quicker a lot more times.

Plus, I think I'm better than you.

It doesn't matter who you are. I almost definitely think I'm better than you. Not a better person––everyone is equal in importance at personhood––not a better athlete, necessarily, either, but just in general better. Maybe you're faster and stronger. But I'm going to be watching you for the time you don't look to the left and then I'll hit you so the jammer can fly by. Or I'm watching to see if you're the type to get flustered by trash talk. And then when you kind-of hit me, but not well, I'm going to laugh at you. And if you're the type who gets flustered by trash talk or someone laughing at hit you give, you're probably also the type who gets flustered by having someone bump you repeatedly. So I'll do that until you're so angry with me that you completely forget to watch the jammer at all.

I'm not sure where this attitude came from. Sometime in middle school, maybe, I decided to just be myself? Maybe ninth grade, when I was tired of being so painfully shy? And "myself" turned out to be someone confident in most situations and determined to take charge because there are always better ways of doing the same ol' things.

But trash talk. I just can't get on board. There's this one cross-country meet I remember so clearly. (High school girls' cross-country is a vicious, vicious sport. Much more vicious in my experience than either rugby or roller derby. But I won't get into the details of cleating, pushing in the trees, spitting...) We were down to the last half mile or so. I'm pretty sure I wasn't one of the first couple girls, but I was probably in the top five. A girl was right on my heels. Some friends of hers were standing along the course yelling something like, "You got that Prep girl! You got her! You can beat her!" She was breathing hard, I was breathing hard, we were both going all-out. The friends yelled, "You got it! You can beat her!" I still don't know why, except that it was just reflex, but I half-turned my head and said, "No, you can't." The girl immediately––dramatically––dropped back and finished way after me, possibly even got passed by someone else. I'll never forget it, and I felt terrible. I hadn't even intended to say anything. I was going to beat her anyway, but not with cheap tricks or cleats to the shin. Some may say it's best to take every advantage. But I wouldn't feel good about it. I like a level playing field.

So really, it just comes down to this: If you trash talk me, I will laugh at you. Because it makes you look ridiculous, and clearly I'm better than you. Mind games aren't going to work on me. And I'm watching you. Who knows where this cockiness came from, but it's pretty much great on the track (and in school, strangely. Thanks, MTPC program, for making me even more overconfident than I need to be).