Volleyball Chronicles

LRK and her four teammates LH, DH, NH and MDeP were gracious enough to invite me onto their co-ed indoor volleyball team at the Capital City Y. Note that I fancy myself as "athletic" but probably haven't played volleyball since high school and haven't participated in an organized, competitive fashion since my last game on the diamond at EC. Wii, 5 mile runs and pitch-n-put do not count.

Last week, I joined them for an open gym on the west shore. Open gym... no pressure... it's all in fun, right? Wrong!

Since meeting LRK, I watch a good deal of volleyball. But I was out of my element at the open gym. I was unsure where to be on the court half the time, my serving was horrendous, passing inconsistent and hitting needed major work. Am I missing anything? Oh, and there was this guy there who joined our team and acted like we were playing in the Olympics. He was a bit of a jerk.

I knew I would be pretty raw, but still... Maybe I was slightly arrogant in thinking I could easily assimilate the skills and actions I saw live and on tv into real, physical action. Guess I don't possess that power like Monica Dawson on Heroes.

Anyway, flash forward to Tuesday night. Game on. We regroup at the Y for our first league game. I think the pregame warm-ups helped a lot. In the first game, the other team serves into the net and we're up 1-0 and I'm set to serve. I rattled off about 8-9 straight points and was feeling good from that point forward. The momentum kept building, and I ended up playing exponentially better than at last week's open gym.

We crushed that team like 25-9, 25-12 and 25-16. My serving was pretty good, passing improved, good hustle, better positioning, hitting... still needing considerable work. But I improved, and that is what I aim to continue doing every game.

So now - like Glass, Karily, Walsh, May, Clay Stanley - I play volleyball. Well, maybe not so much like them, but... I am happy and thankful to LRK and those guys for inviting me on the team.

I'm going for the tee shirt!

Brett - we did not act on your pet peeve and celebrate after every point.
Glass - invitation is open for co-ed doubles on Capital City Island next summer.