Though fall doesn't officially start for several days the signs of fall have been plentiful this past week. Leaves that have enjoyed four months of greenness are letting that color erode into yellow, red, or orange. Cool mornings have become chilly mornings. Geese sound off about their southern journey as they fill the sky with greater frequency. Hunters' shotguns have been sounding off as well, hoping to detour a few of those honkers into a freezer or crock pot. Friday night lights surround dozens of football fields in towns large and small. Deer have exchanged their orange coats of summer for the grey shade that will keep them hidden from hunters and warm all winter. And, if all of those hints didn't scream "FALL!!" quite loudly enough, my role as a volleyball dad cements the arrival of autumn.
When I was in high school my basketball coach and I used to sit together at home volleyball games. We didn't care for volleyball. He had to be there for supervisory reasons, I had to be there for classmate support reasons. We often would discuss all the things we felt were more boring than sitting through the team warm-up portion of the evening. Those were quiet conversations - tough to come up with less entertaining ways to pass minutes than watching volleyball warm-ups. Then the games would start and we'd get a quick reminder that at least during warm-ups the band played. But hey - high school wasn't gonna last forever; when it was done, so too would end my life as a volleyball spectator.
Except it didn't. The high school sweetheart/volleyball star played college volleyball for two years. By the time her career was ending my younger sister's high school volleyball career was beginning, leading to several more years of "fandom". Just for good measure she also went on to play college volleyball, extending my stay in the bleachers by three more years. But she wasn't gonna play forever; when her college career ended, and my youngest sister found other things to do with her time, my days of watching a sport I didn't really like came to an end for good.
Except they didn't. I was blessed with three daughters. Born to the woman I used to watch play volleyball in high school. A woman whose passion for the sport runs deep....genetically deep, apparently, as the first two of those daughters spend most of their year bumpin' and settin' and spikin'. For the last six years, at various times during the year, I've again found myself stuck to a bleacher watching elementary volleyball, junior high volleyball, Junior Olympic volleyball, freshman volleyball, varsity high school volleyball, and even college volleyball....because when we can't go to a daughter's game, we go watch other peoples' daughters play.
This past week I gave up - I sent my white flag up the pole and caved in. After twenty-some years of grumbling about having to watch a sport I've never liked very much I decided to try something different: I've declared myself a volleyball junkie. I was at eldest daughter's varsity game Thursday night, 7th grade daughter's game Friday afternoon, and took in two Division I college games Saturday evening. This coming week I'll be at a home 7th grade game on Tuesday and then travel an hour for the varsity game that night. Thursday will be just a varsity game. Saturday we will head back to campus for another college game. Even the curmudgeoniest volleyball curmudgeon wouldn't endure that kind of schedule, so it's time to give up the grumbles and just enjoy the ride.
To be honest, it's a lot easier to be a volleyball fan now than it was twenty years ago. The game has evolved as the athletes have evolved. It's faster, it's more powerful, it's more intense....it's just a lot more entertaining than volleyball used to be. And while I was happy to support my friends in school and even happier to follow my sister's career - watching my daughters perform on the court is much more special.
Helping my evolution into a volleyball junkie has been the opportunity to view the game at various stages of competence. Eldest daughter's varsity team is struggling so far this season, but compared to her years in the lower levels of the program they look like Olympians. Watching middle daughter's seventh grade team is a great reminder of just how far eldest daughter has come as a player. Seventh graders play a "hot potato" brand of volleyball, doing their best to hit the ball as far away from themselves as possible if it ever comes near. Just a few years removed from that level the varsity team, though not very good, plays with a flow and a purpose. The progress shown by players from age 12 to age 16 is amazing. And then there are the elite players......
The University of Minnesota volleyball program has become a national power, reaching the Final Four last season and holding a national ranking of third right now. My girls and I watched them play the second game of a double-header on Saturday; words cannot do that Gopher team justice. The size, the strength, the speed, the power, the jumping, the hitting.....I kept looking from my seventh grader to those college players, perplexed at how any of them could have ever been at the level of a sevvie, beyond impressed at the level they had worked themselves to now. Regardless of sport I always get a thrill from watching, in person, a team or individual that has worked their way to excellence. That Gopher group is a completely excellent volleyball team.
The bleachers haven't gotten any softer over the years. My back and butt used to wait until the third set of a match to ache; now one or both are hurting midway through the first. Volleyball warm-ups are still just as boring as they used to be, and maybe even worse; pep bands have been replaced by some form of tribal nonsense that today's youth has been brainwashed to believe is music. And whereas volleyball used to be a September/October sport, it, like too many other sports, is played nearly year-round by our high school players. But two-thirds of my daughters love the sport, and for them I will love it, too. I will sit and travel and clap on occasion and follow and gently advise and keep quiet.....and I will enjoy it. This life as "volleyball fan" will pass, and when it does it will be too soon. I'm done wishing the games would go away - I'm a born-again volleyball junkie. Ahhhh-Ace!
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