Straight-jacketed in a goose-down vest

Busman’s holiday - The term alludes to a bus driver who spends his day off taking a long bus ride, or a sports photographer taking 1,500 photos at a game he’s not covering. And so there I was at Sussex Academy on a frigid Wednesday afternoon taking photos of Newark Charter versus Delmar in a state tournament high school field hockey game. I almost didn’t make it to the field from my 4Runner after straight-jacketing myself inside a goose-down vest layered over three shirts and a hoodie. Somehow it got twisted under my left arm and I couldn't get it untwisted on or off. A woman walked by. I was going to ask for help but decided that was weird on top of weird and might activate her fight/flight response system. I got to the field and plopped down in my blue chair, and a Delmar player came over, handed me a Wildcats beanie and said, “Coach Hollamon said to give you this.” Delaware is a small state, and the sports subculture is even smaller. Dare I say a social network? I came in as a player and that is the way I am going out.  

Floppy Poppy ears - My array of masks rocks plain black and white or mostly blue and gold with Viking heads. In August, I was taking photos at a summer middle school field hockey game at DE Turf. A parent asked, “Are you taking photos for the Cape Gazette?” “Yes, how do you know that?” “Because it is written on your face.” I had forgotten about that mask. By the way, my ears aren't as taut and don’t snap back like they used to, and so the tighter the mask, the further it flies when it springs loose from my face.  

Sports jinx - “You can’t jinx an underdog” - Grandma Rose. Cape and Delmar field hockey are in different brackets and go into Saturday’s state championship doubleheader finals at Dover High School as favorites. But to write “prohibitive favorites,” even for Mr. Field Hockey, sinks to the jinx category, only a step below the double whammy. Dynasties belong to histories, not to present times. Both Cape and Delmar know it would be a bigger statewide story if they lose, which is why both programs play like junkyard dogs against underdogs and keep their feet on the gas – how many gas pedals we talking about? – for 60 minutes. The game's insane outcomes are as uncertain as fans in the stands. 

Winter sports - Falls sports started late but it all worked out, and in the next two weeks, all conference and state champions will have been crowned; thank heavens for that. And now it’s winter, so we go indoors to pools to wrestling rooms to big old dingy/danky and swanky gyms. Winter track coaches are talking about “frostbite meets” just like in the old days, and I can relate. I’m just hoping no administrator caucus of consensus pulls the plug on these athletes, who are currently practicing every day after working at their sports all summer.   

Snippets - I get virtual running races and hybrid schedules and Zoom meetings, but I never foresaw a virtual polar bear plunge. All my years fronting the Lewes Polar Bears and jumping five times a year, people would ask, “Aren’t you afraid of getting sick? Afraid of catching something?” And I’d say, “No, nothing can live in that environment.” It's inside, in closed and heated spaces, where airborne contagions bounce off of craniums and Carrier Dome-sized skulls. Anyway, being a teacher and sports guy I have acquired immunity to every bacteria and virus known to man, bats and pangolins. How does an athlete “concentrate” on a single sport? What do you do, stare at the ball? I go to websites4sports.com and check team rosters. There is so much to learn, like why don’t more athletes come out for basketball on both boys’ and girls' sides of the street? Cape has an indoor track team with no indoor track in the state and travel restrictions that prevent teams from going out of state to compete, and yet they have eight coaches and a 10-wheeler truckload of kids. I temporarily forgot there are no middle school sports. That vacuum does damage to development at so many levels, from sports to social to just learning to be a teammate. And some kids are getting lost before they were ever found. Go on now, git!  But how can you git, when you’re already gone?