ME REALLY, REALLY TIRED! PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT

The day of reckoning came: my first real football practice. Flip told me some of what to expect, but I was still pretty nervous.

And it turned out I was right to be nervous. Those were two of the toughest, sweatiest hours I’ve ever had.

For the “warm-up,” Coach had us do a bunch of jumping jacks. Then stretches. Then push-ups. And then we had to run four times around the track. That’s one mile—which is a long way to go. I may be fast, but not for a whole mile. By the time I was starting my fourth lap, most of the team had already finished theirs.

And the problem with that is, when you bring up the rear, everyone else is already waiting to move on to the next thing. So the guy who needs the biggest break is the one who doesn’t get one at all.

After that, we did “starts and stances.” I never knew there was so much to know about standing. I learned the two-point stance, the three-point stance, the four-point stance, and how to take off running from all of them. Flip said I’d get the hang of it, but mostly I was just getting tired and hungry.

We weren’t done yet either. After that, Coach split us up into offensive and defensive squads. Since I was a runner, I got put on offense, and I spent the rest of practice trying to learn how to take my stance… start running… navigate around a whole bunch of moving bodies… watch for a ball that was coming from behind me… and more than anything, NOT let someone grab a flag out of my belt.

For any of you who don’t already know, flag football is like regular football except for this belt you have to wear, with two flags on it. Getting one of those taken off of you is the same thing as getting tackled, but less painful. (Still, that didn’t mean it was easy! Just the opposite.)

The first time I actually caught a pass, I was so excited, I forgot to run. Half a second later—FWIP!—someone grabbed one of my flags.

The next four times I tried, it didn’t go so well. I dropped the ball. Then I took one in the face. Then I dropped it again. Then I missed it completely.

When I finally caught another pass, I was ready.