SPORTS...

Anyone who knows me a bit will find it strange to read an article on this topic so alien to me. Sports- its just a word to me, something that comprises of cricket, football, tennis and a few others…pictures of which I glance through the paper. I have always read the whole newspaper but I very easily jump from the third last to the last page completely skipping the sports section. I haven’t particularly played any sport, or rather, how much ever I have played cannot be considered a valid amount to say, ‘I have played’ neither do I follow any sport regularly. I must admit though that this attitude is partly because of my schooldays when I was what you call the, ‘plump little girl’ surrounded by much thinner ones and was often ridiculed for it, which deterred me from actively participating in any game. For me PT periods used to be more of a scare than fun. Anyway the idea of this piece is really not to get into my schooldays and lament about my passivity.

The other day my cousin (just about as tall as…oops I mean just about my height and much more petite than me) came home with her white shirt turned brown with mud and hair in a state of shock…the only thing I could make out clearly was her radiant smile with all the 32 visible. She had gone to see volleyball match played by her college. She herself plays basketball (to everyone’s surprise considering her ‘little look’) and lately has taken up volleyball as well. Though I should be the last person who’d add to anything on sports( not even the last...!!) the very fact that I am a good listener makes her tell me everything about the day. And so started off her ebullient description of the matches. She started off with how they won the quarter and semi and landed up to the finals against the toughest team. Her animated account of their cheers, the good hits and the bad ones etc almost took me to the ground live!! On noticing my blank expressions when she mentioned about spikers, lifters and underarm service and over arm service, attack line etc she explained her level best about volleyball as a game. Inadvertently she used to get into the cheer cry tempo in between and relive her moments there. So much for being a sports enthusiast I wondered! It was more than an hour but I knew she could go on for another hour on the same thing!! It was then I realized that even watching a sport could be almost as satisfying as playing one.
Another friend of mine is a great football fan, his account on how it all started and what every match (whether to play or watch) meant to him really makes me sit up and think wow now that’s called passion…
Yet another friend is a devout cricket follower. She never plays but you can vouch on her for correctly giving a count of every four and every six that each Indian would have ever hit!!
My dad, granpa etc are all great sports enthusiast, my granpa used to play badminton, tennis etc till the ripe age of 65.
I wonder why I never came in this league…..its not innate…it is to be developed but I never really did….
A sport is one such hobby or passion that teaches you a lot.. more often without your knowledge. It’s a high spirited fun which teaches you the dichotomy of victory and defeat, dedication and loyalty (towards the game, towards your team) The éclat when your team wins because you hit a six or scored a goal or scored a basket, the guilt when you screwed up at the deciding moment, the effervescence of your captain’s hug when you made it, a playful pat or an angry remark by your coach, your prayers when you want a team you support to win and so on. These are things that I have only heard and imagined not the ones I have experienced which I feel greatly deprived of.
So all you sports freaks…!!! You guys rock…never leave this passion come what may!! Like they say its never too late….you mite jus find me watching sum sport with dynamic enthusiasm someday!!! cheers