At this point in life, I neither play nor watch sports. The other night, I was reflecting on this and realized that in the past, most of my involvement in sports was a sort of community item. I played baseball when I was a kid because all my friends did. Then I watched hockey for years because I had friends who did, and I enjoyed the time spent with them. I enjoyed all this, but as a group activity, not something to do solo.
I was enthusiastic about football for a while because my brother-in-law was an avid fan, and we were very close friends. But when they moved away, watching a group of padded men move a tiny ball from one end of a field of grass to the other seemed less critical.
Hockey was the sport that made the largest impression on me. It was the more aggressive sport of the nineteen sixties and seventies. There was lots of aggression, fast moves, snarling, and shouting by the folks attending. Cat hockey is the name I tagged onto the games my cats play with busy balls and other toys. Their moves are reminiscent of the human game. And when Sabrina calls a foul on Marcus, off come the gloves for a fight, and Max ( our cattle dog wants to break it up.
In anycase in a shameless attempt to make you read more of my posts here are some links to my cat hockey stories:
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When you look at COVID, sports speaks volumes. Here, we had soccer matches in empty stadiums, horse races at empty race tracks. Why? What’s the point of any of this, if there aren’t spectators to reap the reward? Online gambling. That’s the only reason sport even exists.
I didn’t know about the prompt — but last night I was thinking about how much playing sports meant to me in my young life. I think there as a little spot in me that thought if I ran fast enough, caught enough balls, hit them hard enough with the bat the world (my dad’s illness) would go away. Some of my happiest memories are playing catch with my dad in the back yard. When I saw the movie, Field of Dreams, I lost it right there in the theater. That’s when I understood. We humans are complex — and sometimes beautiful — creatures. OH! In jr high I got punished for acting out by being “forced” to mark the football field during games. Poor me! running up and down the field! 🤣