You know what’s crazy? I’ll tell you what’s crazy.
13 year old soccer in the hot Atlanta sun.
It was 90 degrees today with 80 % humidity.
I was sitting on the sideline and sweating like a prostitute on a hot tin roof.
I am watching 13 year old boys throw elbows and run like possessed gazelles. The anger is ferocious like a prison jail break. And that’s just the mother’s on the sideline.
“What are you gonna do,” One team mom hollers at the youthful referee making 4 dollars an hour. “You gonna wait till they bleed?”
The poor pubescent punk ass kid with the red flag and whistle doesn’t even look at her. Why? What’s it going to matter in the over all cosmic stew of life?
It’s a Sunday morning and the rain has just subsided. That means the air is thick like mustard gas.
The sun is burning down on my baby boy skull. Sweat is streaking out of my pores like Japanese bullet trains headed for destinations unknown.
The humidity is oppessive. It is oven hot. It is liquid nastiness broiling on my skin.
I imagine this is what a slug feels like on a lilly pad in a swamp.
Welcome to the Atlanta Cup.
A premiere soccer event for teams from all over America.
We are a mighty little team from Williamson County Tennessee. 18 thirteen year old boys who play like a house on fire when they step onto the pitch.
2 games Saturday. 2 Games Sunday. We’ve let up as many goals as Mother Teresa had lovers. In case that metaphor is lost upon you, that means ZERO.
We are 4 -0. We have 8 goals. The opponents Zero. It’s pretty damn impressive. Our goalie took one in the nose today. Bled like a fire hydrant all over his uniform. It was disgusting and beautiful all at once. He is a tough SOB.
Just a flesh wound, I can hear him saying to the coach. That’s what a Goalie is suppose to say, right.
So Monday, when you are bar b queing and heading to the pool, we head back to the pitch. We are in the finals against a team from Northern Atlanta.
they call themselves NASA. No, they are not sponsored by the space program. NASA. It stands for North Atlanta Soccer Association. I hate that name. I’m sure I will hate their club.
We play them Monday in the brutal Labor day heat.
I don’t know much about them. I believe they will lose when they run across our 13 year old buzz saw.
Elbows will fly. Bodies will be checked. Goalies noses will bleed.
It’s been a good trip for this group of young men. They are kids. That means they like ice cream and running in the hallways and pushing all the buttons on the elevators.
But when they lace em up and get on the ball, they are hard nosed, and nasty.
I am the father of one of these nasties. He is a good kid. But when he plays, he has a little silent assassin in him. I like it. Life needs more silent assassins. What we are going to do to NASA Monday, America needs to do to the Chinese and our national debt.
Our coach is a good old boy from the Emerald Isle. He yells at the kids with a brogue. It makes me think of an Irish Spring commercial. In any language he knows he has a powder keg of young legs at his disposal.
18 kids with the will to give their all, to fight, to bleed, to win as a collective unit.
It’s fun. It’s sweaty. It’s just another pressure cooker weekend in Hot-Lanta.
Happy Labor Day everyone.
Hope your nose doesn’t get bloodied.
And that is crazy.