Can You See Me?

Misery. That's what I feel right now--utter misery. You may or may not have noticed that I have been pretty quiet about Tyler's baseball season, and with good reason. We moved Tyler to Little League this year in the hope that he would actually be able to play more, shall we say competitive baseball. As the season progressed, however, and one lost game melted into another, it became clear that . . . oh, how do I put this kindly? Tyler was a good player on a bad team. Let's leave it at that.

I cannot emphasize enough how desperately I longed for Tyler's season to be over. Every time he had a practice or game, it was like a dark cloud descended on our house. And then finally, mercifully, the season was done and we put this failed Little League experience behind us.

Or so we thought.

Just when I thought Tyler had thrown his last strike, he got a phone call inviting him to play in a couple of tournaments as part of a hand-picked team. It's about time! But believe it or not, that's the good news.

The bad news is that out of ALL the other kids on ALL the other North Arlington Little League teams that also could have been chosen, one kid was chosen at the last minute whose mother was nothing but rude to me all season and completely ruined it for me. Think I'm being my occasionally overdramatizing self? Think I might be overreacting? Think I could have been misreading her?

No, no and NO.

This is a woman whom (who?), at the point that we'd never even met, called and asked if Randy and Tyler could pick her son up for practice since they were headed there anyway--that would save her the trouble. Naturally I agreed and had no problem helping her out in that way. That went on to become the regular routine for the next few weeks, my guys leaving the house and going slightly out of their way to pick up her son for baseball practice. Wouldn't you think that after establishing that connection, it would be natural for us to be on somewhat friendly terms at the ball games? Yeah, me too, but instead let me what happened when we met for the first time.

I made my way to the bleachers where it appeared our team's fans were supposed to sit. Now I had never seen this mom before so I didn't know what she looked like, but I did realize almost immediately upon sitting down that this was going to be one of those seasons. And by that I mean that everybody clearly knew each other quite well and their kids had all played ball together before and once again I was the newcomer in the crowd. Talk about a flashback to ninth grade, and that is NOT a year I would care to repeat!

So I sat down and assumed my position while everyone treated me like I was invisible, and I settled in to watch the game. About ten or fifteen minutes into the game I couldn't help but notice that a woman sitting about three bodies to my right was like the queen bee of the hive, and she controlled most of the conversations that took place. She was clearly used to be the center of attention based on her words, body language, etc. But I only gave this marginal thought until I heard her launch into a story about her son and realized her son was the kid Randy and Tyler had been carting to the ball field for a month. I leaned over and said, "Oh, you're __________'s mom? I'm Tyler's mom!" She looked at me coolly--yes, coolly--and said in what I would call not-the-friendliest-tone-I've-ever-heard, "I know." And then she calmly turned and resumed the conversation she was having with those around her. Alrighty then. I sat there in humiliated silence, wondering what in the world I had done to warrant that kind of behavior from her, but I was left to wonder as she never once deigned to look my way again.

I sat through several other games throughout the season just like that, sitting in invisible silence while she commanded the attention of those around her. I remember one game in particular when she thought it was her turn to bring snacks, so she schlepped this big cooler over to the dugout with drinks and a box of individually-packaged chips when she noticed that another parent had brought similar-looking fare. After consulting with the parent it was determined that she had her dates mixed up and was supposed to provide snacks the following week. Oh. My. Word. As I sat right there on the bleachers and she did her best to ignore me, she told and re-told her sob story about how she'd had to drag that cooler all by herself from the car to the field and blah blah blah blah blah . . . I'll bet I listened to her tell that story no less than ten times because every time another parent would straggle in, of course they just HAD to know what had happened and so there she would go again. Brother.

The only time she ever said something directly to me was at another game--I won't repeat what she said but it was a sneering, condescending comment about Tyler that caused me to react in a way that is completely unlike me. I'm not kidding--I'm usually a kill-em-with-kindness kind of gal, but after being ignored by her all season long, when she turned and spoke to me and I was certain I hadn't misunderstood her, I simply stared at her. Just stared without saying a word. There was a time that I would have felt it was rude not to make a reply when someone was speaking to me, but this was definitely one of those times when I had to make a choice and I chose not to dignify her comments with a response.

Oh boy, I just can't wait for this tournament to start.