A Boy Named Yellow
This image isn't ACTUALLY how I feel. I just think it is funny.
It was a warm summer day when I walked with trepidation toward a small group of people who were gathered outside of a softball field. I was feeling anxiety about this meeting. My nervousness was not a result of being an outsider, it was actually because I had been very connected within this group of people. This colorful and beautiful group of people had been involved in my life and had been my community while I had dated one of the members of the group. He was (is) a fantastic young man (for the purpose of this story we will refer to him as Yellow).
Yellow and I had a significantly long relationship, conversed about marriage, and were on our way towards “forever” until I (very unceremoniously and painfully) ended our relationship… We had sort of gotten back together a few times, but by the time I met with the group to play kickball, any romantic proclivities were not going to be entertained.
Yellow and I basically ignored each other, but his new girlfriend who was very friendly and unaware of who I was did not ignore me. #notawkwardatall Surprisingly, her and I’s interaction isn’t even the worst thing about this story…
Teams for kickball are picked as I say hello to my old friends, continue to avoid Yellow, and fidget with my shorts, which now seem WAY TOO SHORT and tight, why did they suddenly get smaller in this setting? And why did my t-shirt feel ginormous? Needless to say, I was not feeling my most powerful self on this dusty softball field. Hanging out with ex-boyfriends is never actually that great.
Yellow was picked as the all-time pitcher, which was cool.. Yay for forced eye contact.
The game began and progressed well, I thought that maybe this interaction would not be that bad after all. As we went through the line up, it became my time to “bat” or kick (whatever they call it in kickball). I got a good pitch from Yellow, kicked the ball and began to run towards first. Yellow fields the ball as any healthy, athletic young man would do, and then, as per the rules of kickball (which apparently include that you can make an out occur through hitting the other person with the ball itself), he lobbed the kickball at me as I am running towards first and I cause an out to occur for my team…
This would be a nice place to end the story, right? I was out through getting tagged and then the game continued. That would be a nice ending, but that isn’t quite what happened.
Yellow threw the kickball at me and not only caused an out, he beaned me in my face…pretty hard, actually. The whole field fell silent as they observed what transpired. In that moment I felt that I should have NEVER come to kickball, I also decided that I would never play the wretched game again. The field still silent and at a loss for words myself, I could think of nothing better to do but throw my head back and laugh, very loudly. The absolute perfect setting of that kickball game, which allowed me to get beaned in the face by a kickball, thrown by my ex-boyfriend was just too good and I couldn’t help but replay the scenario in my head as I turned back and walked towards the dugout.
In my opinion work is like a kickball game, sometimes you get a great hit, and sometimes you get a kickball to the head.
How’s that for some motivation on this Monday?
Have a happy day, friends.
p.s. Yellow did apologize to me right after the incident occurred, he’s a good guy.