Adventures in Volleyball

Some of my students have been pestering me for a couple of months to come play volleyball with them after school. Now my volleyball playing is usually limited to one week a year at family camp (I promise it's not as dorky as it sounds), but I love playing, as long as the competition doesn't get more serious than trying to spike on your dad.

So playing with students sounded like fun, and yesterday I brought clothes to change into and headed down to the volleyball court. It took about ten minutes to realize that this was not the pick-up game I had imagined. The gym teacher was running the show, there were approximately a million kids there, and before I knew it, we were doing drills, balls were flying everywhere, and my old P.E. anxieties started to resurface, coupled with questions like "Can a teacher do this and maintain any dignity?" Worse, when I finally did get to play a game, I was on a team with 11th and 12th grade girls pitted against six middle school boys. I'm not sure that it was meant to be demeaning, but it sure felt that way. I bet it was fun to watch because neither team was acting like one: the little boys just wanted to pelt us with their surprisingly strong serves but got in each other's way when the ball was returned and they actually had to work together, and the girls on my team shied away from the ball and looked at each other accusingly when it hit the ground. They beat us 2 games to one, but at least I personally had relatively little to be ashamed of, which was my highest hope for the afternoon.

In other news, I discovered that I grade papers very efficiently when listening to country music. Thank you, Rascal Flatts.