She Was A Knockout!

I had retired from my semi-pro and professional soccer career and was in a transition trying to decide what I wanted to do next.  It was 1996 and for the time being I was helping a friend manage one of north Dallas’ well-known nothing-but-soccer retail stores.  Many times coaches, team captains, and booster-clubs would come in for assistance in ordering team uniforms for the upcoming school or amateur league seasons.  This time of year also included the local women’s teams and co-ed teams.  But before I go any further, let me explain the well-known fact risk a “retired” male professional (and lifetime single-gender) soccer player takes when joining an amateur co-ed team and league.

The Play-At-Your-Own-Peril Rule

I began playing soccer at the age of ten.  By middle school I was playing competitive soccer – what today is called select soccer – and wanted not only to play professionally, but try to at least make the U.S. Men’s National Team roster.  What was often whispered among such serious players with such lofty dreams was try your best not to play with or against the clueless recreational teams and players, but more critically never play with or against girls.  Now ladies, before you go into your rant, please bear with me and let me explain what it’s about and why it was a whispered rule.

First of all, not playing against recreational teams is a policy most major sports franchises enforce and hence protect their high-valued stars.  Second of all, and a lesson I learned several times in my career, from a tactical and confidence standpoint the stronger professional players gain very little or nothing at all by playing the weaker/amateur team other than a practice, or an opportunity to let 2^nd and 3^rd stringers get playing time.  In those rare cases the pro team takes a slim chance in damaging their status or image if they play poorly or worse, lose.

The reason male pro players almost never play competitively against women – and I am genuinely not trying to insult female athletes – is for the simple reason that both teams and genders risk unnecessary injury.  In sports, on the whole, women’s bodies move differently than men’s.  Momentum, for whatever reason, is initiated and managed differently between the genders.  If you don’t believe me, simply watch the two sexes in slow-motion action and how they ‘collide’.

It is a well-established unspoken rule that in competitive contact sports a man plays at his own risk against women.  I had known this law for eighteen years.

The Never-ending Beer and Female Introductions Carrot

Returning now to 1996, three attractive female soccer players have been visiting our soccer store often in preparation for the upcoming co-ed season opener.  Their player roster is also not complete; they desperately need a goalkeeper!  For reasons unknown to me, no one presently on the team wanted to play goalkeeper.  And before these very charming women asked, I knew exactly what was about to come out of their seductive mouths…. “We have heard about how good a goalkeeper you are and that you’ve even played professionally!”  Huh!?  I wasn’t expecting that approach!  Hmm, I’ll give ‘em that…. stroking my ego is a good tactical move.  But you ladies, I was thinking, are going to have to come up with a lot more before I even entertain the remote possibility of risking my safety!  I shook my head two or three times, No, sorry ladies.

And then came the coup d’état.

“We will buy” they countered with smirks “all of your beer after every game and promise to introduce you to a minimum of three HOT women players each weekend!”  To say I was aroused would be gross understatement.  “When does the season start?” I replied.

In my hyper-excited mind, I imagined consecutive weekends of hot dates galore and massive amounts of sleep-overs.  The score line of our games or whether we had a winning season or not was of absolutely no concern for me.  I happily signed my lop-sided contract!

Game 1 of 12

The referee’s opening whistle blew.  The comical usual cheering and smack-talk began from both teams and their fans/family members on the sidelines.  It truly made me laugh; I had already heard the most abusive and slandering and loudest rhetoric in my career having played around the world.  I was more entertained by my thoughts of the post-game festivities.  Damn, we were only about ten minutes into our game.  Ah, here comes a cross into my penalty box from my left, between the penalty spot and the eighteen-yard line….easy, easy pickings.  I quickly come out to snatch it.

I scream the usual scream to my defense “Keeper’s!”  I launch into my usual very high-vertical leap, snag the ball with extended arms ABOVE my head, and as per my umpteen years of training and experience proceed to pull the ball down into my chest….. but then SLAM and everything goes black and silent.

The next moment I remember are the EMT’s putting the smelling sauce under my nose.  HOLY SHIT my entire jaw and face are in excruciating pain!  The EMT’s keep asking me several questions, load me onto their gurney, and I am transported to the nearest ER.  There the attending physician informs me that I need 10 stitches on my right under side edge of my chin, and my jaw is broken in two places on the left side near the front of my ear.  I will also have to have my jaw and mouth wired shut for six to eight weeks.  Two of those three women who talked me in to playing are there consoling me “…they didn’t score.”  With my best scolding look I murmured what I hoped sounded like “This is NOT how I wanted to frickin meet women!”  I mean shit, I never even saw her!  How many beers could have been bought with the upcoming ambulance, emergency room, and doctors bill!?

My co-ed season was over before it began.

Image courtesy of rakball.net

Further details of the collision shared by them made my predicament even more depressing – and over time, made theirs a favorite pub story.  A long story short, the girl THOUGHT by unimaginable lotto odds, she’d have a chance to head that ball…. with her eyes closed for God’s sake!  The top of her head hit my chin if that gives you ANY idea of how wrong she was!  And by the way, that ball she thought she could head was firmly in my hands three-feet above my chin!  In my profession, on my futebol pitch, with other professional male athletes, it was a NO BRAINER that no one could have had any chance of getting their head on that ball.  They would not have even jumped!  I hope as you are reading you are picking up on my enraged astonishment.

May 2013

I am fortunate to have great dental genetics from both parents.  As I was taught by my parents, I take above average care of those teeth.  As a result, I have learned that my mouth is fine with irregular orthodontic checkups; like on the every 3 to 5 year frequency or more.  In fact, I did not get my first cavity until I was 24-years old and it was barely a cavity.  Often orthodontists would admire my teeth, entire mouth and all my wisdom teeth.

This time I was returning to the dentist after twelve years.  However, this visit I knew I was well past the “praise” of the hygienist and her doctor:  I had what was likely a developing abscess.  I was expecting the dreaded line “Yes, it will have to come out.”  But then my new orthodontist asked a question that was totally from left field.

“Have you ever had a facial injury?”

The Good News, the Bad News, and the Recurring News

My orthodontist confessed that he really didn’t have to ask that question; he knew I had had a traumatic facial injury.  He was viewing all the evidence on the x-rays up in the light.  In his many years of practice he had seen it a thousand times.  And once again, I had to retell the above story to him.  As I was about to begin, I thought to myself, that damn invisible woman is STILL haunting me!  And that proverbial line:  I didn’t even get her name.  The dentist begins his verdict…

The good news is that for not being in for a checkup and cleaning for ages, your condition is good and normal.  The bad news is that not only does that abscessed tooth need to come out, but you have three more that need extraction, probably a fourth, and maybe a fifth.  “And you know what’s strange about your condition,” he asked, “you don’t have cavities in any of those 3-5 teeth!”  The erupting roots in all those teeth are a result of that facial injury.

Now over the next 3-weeks, I will be getting surgical extractions, fitted for a 3 or 5 toothed denture, and paying $2,500 – $5,000 to stop any further problems; from a problem that began with:  When does the season start?

The 1970′s Carpenters song Close to You goes on and on in my head:

That is why all the girls in town
(Girls in town)
Follow you
(Follow you)
All around
[But I saw nothing!]…
Just like me, they long to be
Close to you

* * * * * * * * * *

An All-Points-Bulletin for athletic men who have weakened will-power around all things seductively female:

Sooner or later, one way or another, you WILL pay for a woman’s company, that introduction, and anything else you desire of her!

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This work by Professor Taboo is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://professortaboo.wordpress.com.

Working Waggle Dancers

The pond and piles of leaves. Click for larger image.

Raking and picking up the fall live-oak leaves has been overdue.  Not only that but living on top of a hill with never-ending breezes blowing the tiny leaves into the waterfall and pond, add to and make the job more tedious and longer!  Then it soon reaches the filter which protects the pump, which quickly needs cleaning too!  Last week and this week I have been Yard Man, Pond-n-Pump Man, and like the honey bees we have around, doing it all under the influence and motivation of my loud vocal trance music and the smell of jasmine:  the Dancing Yard Pond-n-Pump Man.  I must admit, there might be a better way of completing these spring chores, but for me there’s no other enjoyable way of doing them.

As I was cleaning out the pond, treating the water with algae killer, and rebuilding the goldfishes’ rock covered hideaway, I could not help noticing the number of honey bees buzzing me.  They didn’t seem to be as interested in me as they were the water and Lilly-flowers; no need for alarm.  They are worker bees obeying their Queen to go out, seek and find the stuff of food and honey for the hive.  Such is the system of life in springtime.  But curiously when I was at my laptop adjusting the volume from loud to louder, four to six of those buzzers were buzzing my speakers, sometimes the laptop.  I thought “Now that is curious!”  Why were they so interested in my speakers?  Or were they interested in what was coming out of my speakers?  Then I thought “Hah!  They must be Vocal Trance and dance lovers just like me!”  And that’s when it hit me…. bees communicate with each other by specific dances and by the flapping (or buzzing) of their wings:  vibrations/sound waves.

I, like the bees, was working harder by my music and its vibrations.

While I continued to clean the pond and sit next to my music on the laptop to take breathers, I had no reason to be bothered by the honey bees.  In a sense, we were both doing the same work, for our home/hive.  We were dancing busy bees.  We would come over to the music, feel it, and be re-energized.  Then it was back to dancing…. back to work.

Being the inquisitor that I am, I decided to lookup how honey bees communicate with each other.  Scientists have learned that bees talk to each other in remarkably similar ways humans do.  Of their five senses, honey bees communicate through pheromones and choreography.  Think about it, other than talking, how do we like to communicate when we are out in public?  Certain perfumes and cologne mix well with our body’s skin oils, or pheromones.  Other than talking, how else do we communicate?  By how we move.  Honey bees tell each other where a food source is by doing a waggle dance.  All the worker bees (or in this case, dancing bees) pick up on it.  For people our motions and manners convey who we are and what we are doing.  Honey bees are not much different.

Our jasmine vine and blossoms

Speaking of attractive smells, there was a spot in the yard I particularly liked to work and work slowly.  It was downwind of the jasmine vines.  If you have not smelled fresh jasmine blooms, then you are missing out on one of nature’s sweetest addicting aromas you’ll ever have the pleasure of inhaling.  Whoa!  I asked myself, is there a way to bottle this or roll it and smoke it?  Or put it in a low-burning oil fragrance bowl?  Holy cow, is there a support group Jasmine-Anonymous for jasmine addicts?  Because I’ll become a lifer!  And no surprise, guess who else enjoyed the blossoms?  My waggling work buddies the honey bees.

As a young boy growing up who had to rake and pick up all the leaves in our huge yard, and inevitably come down with allergies and sinus drainage and swelling, I never looked forward to or enjoyed early spring.  However, this time was very different.  This time I could blast my inspiring music, work and dance with the bees, and the entire time take big whiffs of jasmine like I was inhaling that cigarette after incredible sex.  Though I don’t smoke, I know smokers know what I’m talking about.

In a weird way I want the work to go slowly.  I’m enjoying it.  I guess you would have to be here to understand.

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This work by Professor Taboo is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://professortaboo.wordpress.com.