The other night I watched part of a Red Sox game against the Seattle Mariners with my father before I went to bed. In the morning I looked up the final score. The headline read: Sox can’t solve Leake as Rodriguez struggles
Leake was the pitcher for Seattle, and he has more pitches than numbers on a Bingo card.
“What do you think he’s going to throw this time?” one commentator would ask the other.
“I don’t know,” the other replied.
Apparently the Red Sox didn’t know either. Pitcher vs. Batter is such a mind game.
Seattle won 7-2.
Meh — baseball is a long season. I wasn’t too dejected.
I’ve been procrastinating planning swim camp for a while. I set up two meetings last week to discuss the nuts-and-bolts of swim camp with the staff that I would have. We planned activities and scheduled who would be where when. This is the 4th year that I’ve run the swim camp. I wasn’t cocky, but felt like I had a pretty good handle on it.
Plus I knew that a curveball or two would be thrown at me.
It goes with the territory.
Yesterday (Sunday) Bud and my children were covering little signs I had made with clear contact paper so they would withstand a week in the pool.
Last Wednesday I had 22 kids registered so I planned for 28. You never know.
This morning I got up early to cut up our watermelon snack. 30 wedges should be plenty. I put it in a big bowl and brought it to the pool along with tape for my signs, sandals for my feet, and my whistle for silencing the small masses.
Curveball #1 — It turns out that I’m not allowed to tape anything on the walls. No worries, I thought. The signs were cheesy anyway.
Curveball #2 — Between last Wednesday and Monday (today), the camp had grown from 22 to 31. I didn’t have enough supplies for some of the activities. No worries, I thought. I have several sets of siblings and siblings can share.
Curveball-slider-fastball-knuckleball-all-rolled-into-one — Two of the three pools were not available to me. AND the pool that was available was also being shared with adult lap swimmers and another camp. Maybe I could have three lanes.
I may have started hyperventilating.
Changeup pitch — Over one-third of the swimmers who signed up for my SWIM camp could not swim. One of the pools we couldn’t use was the shallow teaching pool. Now I had safety concerns.
We were told that we should have asked. Asked to use the pool for swim camp? A swim camp scheduled by the facility?
Apparently, it was my fault for not asking. Asking wouldn’t have changed anything. It just would have prepared me.
I was speechless.
So we fumbled (<– sorry, football analogy) through the morning.
The kids had fun.
Who knew that kids could have fun in such circumstances?
And I went home still feeling totally blindsided.
The prompt for today is my greatest regret. My greatest regret today was agreeing to run the swim camp.
It’s not my greatest regret, though. That has to do with far bigger things — missed opportunities with people I love.
However, today, I’m reeling.
The Red Sox couldn’t solve Leake, and I couldn’t solve Monday at swim camp.
BUT — tomorrow is a new day, with no mistakes in it yet. (Anne of Green Gables)
I can’t wait.
Hot Dogs and Marmalade 
Those are some serious curveballs.
Expect the unexpected is one thing but that was a mean old day you had to navigate. Be proud that you got through it with such aplomb and Anne of GG has it right, as ever ….