I am a sports fan

I am a sports fan.

I thank my father for this. He has regularly told me that unlike most men, he wished that I was a girl, because he knew that he would put too much pressure on a little boy to be an athlete. Dad was a baseball player. He played on all of the little league, high school, all-star teams that they had. I love hearing the stories he tells, mostly because it sounds like a play-by-play with color commentary of some of the most exciting games ever played. I know people make fun of what they call their parents or grandparents "war stories," but for some reason I have always loved listening to my dad's.

I still remember my dad teaching me how to throw a baseball and a football. I also remember a painfully bad attempt to teach me how to shoot a basketball. The football was hard and still is, but I've got it down now. I have small hands now, and of course even smaller ones when I first learned to throw. Because of the size of the football, (and I seem to remember it being a mini football) I could still not get my hand around enough to not let it slip out of my hand. Even today, with a regulation sized ball, my hand is too small it seems to be able to stay in my hand, let alone through a decent spiral, which I do. The baseball was much easier.

Then came catching. Good reflexes made that pretty easy although I remember being scared of ball when my dad threw it. I learned quick that if I kept my eye on the ball, I didn't get hit. Good life lesson there.

Batting was interesting as well. I did have the obligatory swing the bat allllllll the way around, watch the ball sail right on by. But I got that too.

I always figured that my dad would have wanted a boy, and sometimes I felt that I needed to do boy things to make him happy and for him to like me (child of divorce, I got over it). Then I realized I really just love to play the sports and watch the games.

I claim "hometown" sports teams as the ones I follow, mostly. Hometown, because it's Dad's hometown and because I spent most summers out east with him, learning said sports. So, yes, I am a Redskins fan. I am a Caps fan. I am a Nats fan. I am a Wizard fan. I am a United fan. I am a Mystics fan. (for all of you that have no idea what sports those are: in order, football, hockey, baseball, men's basketball, soccer, women's basketball.) The last three I don't necessarily watch regularly, but if I have to choose a team, those are the ones.

The one exception to this rule is that I am also a Boston Red Sox fan. Random, I know. Here is the reasons. My dad was a Senators fan, (Original Washington baseball team), when they moved (long before I was born), he said he would be a Yankee fan until Washington got a team again. I started out being an Baltimore Orioles fan, until Cal Ripkin retired, then I looked at the team and thought "I don't really have an attachment to the team, just him." So I started looking for a new team. I thought about the Yankees, but they were too....bourgeois. I became anti-Yankee fan, meaning as long as the Yankees lost I was happy. From there it was a natural progression to become a Red Sox fan.

I know that when sports come on the television, I easily get sucked in. It does not even matter what sport it is. Golf can suck me in if that's all I have to watch.

So that being said, Go all my sports teams, have good seasons whenever they are!