Alas...I Was Born Sans the Sports Crapola Gene

I have quite a few ailments that fall into the autoimmune category.  Some pretty ugly, some not so much.

We'll address those perhaps down the line, but for today I would like to address my being born with a handicap.  I was born without the Sport Crapola Gene.

As handicaps go it isn't a bad one, in fact, in my particular instance it is a case of not missing what you never had.

That being said...I like to go to sporting events.  I like to go for the music and people watching, the camaraderie and the energy.   One recent aspect of sporting events that really appeals to me is watching Left Brain strike up bromances with his fellow sportaholics.  He is always laughing at me for the way people I have never met will come to me and strike up a convo like we were long lost friends meeting up for the first time in a few years, and yet...get him in a sports crapola situation and he turns into Chatty Cathy himself! 

IF I had a child, sibling, relative, or friend of any sort playing the sport I can get caught up in it.  This makes sense to me.  I love that person...their success is a happiness in my score book.  I want to see them do well, I want to see them have fun, I want to see them with their friends/collegues, and I want to enjoy their enjoyment.

I can go to soccer practice for Caybob and Hanners and spend a good two hours yelling and cheering for them.  Seeing them excel and their joy in their success...HOMERUN for Grammy! 

What I don't understand is how people (and men especially) can get caught up in something that:
a) in the long run means NOTHING
b) has nothing to actually do with them or anyone they personally know
c) makes them scream or yell at the television like they are actually a part of the program
d) causes them much disappointment and duress when their team of choice stinks or perpetually loses
e) has them adopting players.  "That's my boy."  Really???  Your boy?  Does your wife know?
f) makes them join "fantasy" teams

*looks up...I think that about covers it*

Left Brain is very good to put up with my  handicap and has actually given up some of the fix of watching sports...he even gamely pretends to watch Dancing With the Stars with me.  Left Brain is a very good man...even if sports testosterone tears through his veins he valiantly soldiers on, fighting it for me. His noggin is full of useless sport trivia, and he can spout it at the drop of a hat. 

I can say to him, "Left Brain, tomorrow I think we should run to Costco for dog food," and he'll not remember that comment ever being uttered.  He can, however, remember how many times Joe Blow from the '85 Dodgers got splinters in his keister from sitting the bench for five consecutive games, due to some blow up that he had with John Doe in a game with the Braves on a sunny day, with a temp of 58 degrees, and a SW wind at 3 miles per hour, in June! 

I don't care that Left Brain is so into it.  In fact, I like that he has something that  makes his heart race and blood pump, other than me.  I like to watch him throw his arms around and yell at the people on the screen.  I smile sweetly when he talks about snake drafts and has a bromance at a game.  When I go down to the man cave and see the superfluous amount of sports crappola books that line bookshelves I get a warm fuzzy feeling in the pit of my stomach that he has so much of what he loves about him (ok, maybe that isn't the reason I feel that when I see them, but ... whatever).

He can try to explain it all he wants.  Others have tried, others have failed. 

What truly makes me chuckle is when he tries to liken it to ... oh...my love of shoes.  I find that argument illogical and one he will forever lose because one does need to have shoes.  Do they  need as many as I do?  Probably  not, but then again they are needed. 

So while he sits, contemplating his losses on his Fantasy Football League (that term even makes me grin), and while he checks scores on the teams he loves...I'll just sit beside him, browsing shoe sales and thinking..."I love him as is, and maybe it isn't me that has the handicap...maybe it is HIM!"

Soul Food

If you were to look up the definition of soul food you'd likely find the following as an example:

soul food

Noun:

Traditional southern African-American food.

I'd like to tell you about a few of the things that I consider soul food. Granted none of them meet the deifiniton standards of the description above, but they are things worth sharing and talking about!

soul food

Noun:          Something that fills you with peace, joy, love, energy, exuberance, happiness, contentment.

#1 ~ My grandbabies. 

 Ok, they are no longer actually babies but for their Grammy (me) it matters not if they are 3 or 30...forevermore they will be my babies.  Nothing quite fills my soul like time spent with them.  I'd always heard that old line "if I had known how fun grandchildren were, I'd have had them first" and thought before their advent ... "what a horrible thing to say.  What about your kids?"  Well, get yourself a couple grandchildren and you'll know it is true.  You see them and this rush of love infuses you, it is overwhelming in its scope and intensity.

Their laughter, their little comments, the things they share, the things that are important to them are the things that fill me.  I've decided to begin keeping a journal of some of the things they've said because a time will come when I will be gone, and they will have forgotten those things, and they are too priceless not to take time to keep.  I actually breathe better, and happier when they are in anywhere near.  My hope is with my marriage I'll be able to see them more often.

Caybob...I am so bonded, heart and soul to this boy that Left Brain (my man) swears I love Caybob more than him.  That is not true in the slightest.  I love them differently.  I love them both fiercely though :)  Caybob says things that make me smile, but all he has to do is BE and my life is better.  He's brilliant and quirky...interesting and interested.  His love of learning is something that keeps me in awe of him.  His grin, makes my heart leap.  Soul food indeed.

Hanners...I lived on planet penis so long I seriously didn't know what I'd do with a girl in my world.  Then I began to learn.  She's a beauty.  She truly is.  She's fiery and ornery, strong and brave.  She's got a spark that makes me so very proud.  This little girl is going to be a looker and a pistol and I don't think my son has any idea what awaits him with this one.  Her laughter, her precocious ways, her lack of fear and her love and ease with people...sigh, she's just delightful.  I love her so much it hurts me not to see her regularly.  Soul food with a side of ornery...love it.  *my family says she is a mini-me...oh how that pleases me too*

They are the appetizers of my brand of soul food...and what a way to start a good soul food meal!

#2 ~ Love

Granted there are all kinds of love, but today I'm going to talk about my soul food love of choice.

GRAND LOVE

What is Grand Love?  Grand Love is a love that makes you stronger, makes you happy, makes you feel content and that wonderful feeling of things being "right."  Grand Love says "we can, you can, I can."  All things are possible with Grand Love because nothing is impossible with it. 

Left Brain is my Grand Love.  Through his love I see things I never saw as possible before...seemingly possible all of a sudden.  Through his love I am strong, and even in my fear, 1 minute held in his arms and against him gives me a peace I cannot describe.  It infuses me with contentment and peace, joy and warmth.

I've told my sisters this and it is so true, with him...I'm free to just be myself.  Nothing else is expected or desired.  Do you know how freeing that is?  How strong that makes one?  I didn't until  now.  He's given me the strength to face some things that I may not have wanted to face before, ugly, scary things ... and I never have to do it alone.  He's always there.  I can just let go and fly or fall...he'll cheer me as I fly, he'll catch me if I fall.

Never have two people been more different than Left Brain and myself.  He cerebral, huge vocabulary, Spanish loving, me more artsy and right brained.  Never have two people been more blessed.  We both know this.  Sure we have our differences, but through Grand Love...well all things are possible, because again, nothing is impossible!

I cannot wait to share my "forever" with this lovely, charming, quirky human being.  One who is so smart I was afraid to go out with him for fear that he would be bored to tears with me in moments.  One who makes me laugh like no other.  One who holds me in the night when fear overwhelms me and never complains.  One who goes to dance class with me, and doesn't mind my laughter when things get all funked up.  One who will sit with me, fight for me, long for me, and be mine forever.

How blessed are those that find Grand Love.

I won life's lotto when he walked into my life.  I stepped out of a car one day came around the corner, saw him and my life changed...for the WAY better.   Grand Love...it's the dessert of soul food, you can never get enough.  I love you Tony.

#3 ~ Tree Tunnels

I've always had a love of trees.  My father loved trees, maybe I love them due to his love of them, or maybe it is something we can inherit, but I love them.  When they come in the form of tree tunnels, my heart slows, my soul sighs, and my world becomes peaceful. 

When my boys were little we'd often travel a stretch of road that had a long tree tunnel.  In the summer it was a lane of life, green, brilliant and stunning. It closed you in and away from the world in the most beautiful way.  In the fall, the colors beautiful and vibrant, your world still shut away but you were cocooned in color, and all my favorite colors.  In the winter, tree tunnels would be made up of snowy lanes, trees with their leaves all gone but now frosted in a gorgeous white.  No one can paint a picture like our God can, and when it comes to tree tunnels, this girl things He outdid himself.

At points in a tree tunnel the peace and warmth I felt would fill me so much that I'd sigh.  My youngest son began calling them 'relaxing roads' because they made his "mama-girl" sigh and relax. 

I'm so thankful for tree tunnels and the spiritual soul food they provide.

#4 ~ Bodies of Water

I don't care if it is a creek, a river, a lake or an ocean, my heart is pleased most when I am near a body of water.  If I believed in past lives, I'd say I was a sailor, or someone who lived on some body of water.  My favorite body of water happens to be the Caribbean Sea...but I do also feel an affinity with Lake Michigan.  I'm lucky to have been born in the Winter, Water, Wonderland.  Michigan is one gorgeous state, I'm so happy to have had the change to grow up there and know it so well.

 I'll marry in June.  I'll marry my Grand Love, beside a body of water, surrounded by family and friends, what a lucky lady I am. 

This soul food centers me, makes me realize how little I am in the big scheme of things.  From the sound of the waves on the shore that soothe  me, to the warmth of the water and the beauty that lives beneath it...this soul food puts me at peace.   Bodies of water are a comfort soul food for people such as myself.

#5 ~ Bulldogs



I know, I know.  Some people (even Left Brain, who loves the boys) say they are an ugly dog.  A manmade dog with a myriad of health issues, but something about them makes me smile and laugh.  They are a happy little breed.  Slobbery, exuberant and pigheaded.  I love watching Left Brain with them.  They love him (and licking him) and he loves them (sans the licking).  To watch them play together makes my heart glow.  To watch them tug of war or to watch the little guy play keep away from the big guys....it's the stuff many laughs are made of.  Joy in something you just LOVE ... that's a late night, extra yummy snack type of soul food!

#6 ~ Laughter

I get my energy from others, I'm an extrovert.  When I took the Myers Briggs test at the library I worked at as part of a team building exercise, I got singled out because not only was I an extrovert, I was an off the charts extrovert.  Left Brain (that man o' mine) is always shaking his head at me.  If I'm not making a new friend, someone is making me a new friend.  I love this.  Imagine then what energy I get when laughing with other people.  It is to me what new batteries are to the Energizer bunny.  Laughter is party soul food.

Soul food...I hope anyone reading this has a day filled with it.