Sportsday

The dreaded day of the year for the young girl who has no interest whatsoever in athletics. She is in a team called Mortlock (red) and has no friends in this group (some of the girls are in her home class but they don't socialise) so I guess having Mum there for the whole day makes it less traumatic for her (I guess that not having me there would force her to socialise or sit alone - whatever, we had a great day). It was windy and cold though and having lost my layer of blubber, the wind just went right through me, despite the fact that I had a thermal t-shirt (from Target) a jumper and a thick overcoat and was still COLD!!! I did manage to bring my woollen gloves but could have done with one of my knitted beanies (which I have taken to making at night whilst watching the box). She did herself proud. She was suffering from a sore throat since Saturday and I kept her home on Tuesday but she did the 100m sprint (came last), 400m run ("Mum, I didn't come last, I came 3rd last", how proud I was to see her trying) long jump (not much success there), and the piece de resistance (i know that is not how you spell it but you get what I mean), she was in the final for the 100m relay (you get picked for this not on ability, but a quiz or a guessing game) and was coming 3rd when CRASH, they have to go around a witches hat at the end of the course and another girl collected her (that and the fact she was probably off balance with a blocked ear all day) and crashed down on her right side and couldn't even stop herself from falling. Man, I nearly cried. She was doing so well and hurt her hip and I bet her pride was broken too. She tried so hard not to cry but I guess the pain and the burst bubble just overwhelmed her. I didn't even see how the rest of the team went but found out they came last. They were however, rewarded with a Fourth place badge and I gathered up the girls and we went and saw the teachers as they didn't give the badges to them at the end of the race. They were pleased and Tori was stoked (through her pain and tears) as she said to me earlier on in the day that she didn't think she would get a ribbon. Her whole team actually came last on the day (years 3-7) but it was around 20 points between the final 3, the team that came first romped it in. Good luck to them.



Note: if this at all sounds like a parent who is disappointed on her child's lack of achievements, I've written it wrong. I am proud of my girl and how she has come ahead from last year, she ran the whole distance in the 400m, she was never disappointed that she never shot a goal, she was happy that Mum was with her and had someone to cheer her on. She is a legend in my eyes, (and has a fourth place ribbon to proudly show her Dad when he comes home next week).