No Harm, No Foul...

...or No Blood, No Foul...

In a pick-up game of basketball or any other sport for that matter there are no referees so you have to make your own calls.  It is fairly normal to have a guy amongst the many to be known as a flopper... he'll call a foul on you for standing anywhere near him; if you touch him he'll fall and whine about injury; he's capable of more melodrama than a teenage girl in the throes of heartbreak.  I do not like that guy.  Nobody likes that guy. 

I take it to the extreme.  That is, I am the complete opposite of him... to my own detriment.  I would call my own fouls against others but I rarely called fouls that others committed on me.  Even the obvious ones.  I cannot fathom why.  I only know that I have always behaved this way and lately I have been wondering about it.

Photo by Joe Pic

On July 1st I fought for the 115lbs Tuff-n-Uff Title in Las Vegas.  In the 3rd round my opponent was deducted a point for headbutting.  The fight ended in a draw.  She had been warned throughout the fight to stop.  This is not a question of incident or accident.  I prefer to not be cynical about this.  I prefer to give her the benefit of the doubt as I do with most people about general life occurrences.  I prefer to not assume malicious intentions.  And ultimately it is simple, as coaches say over and over again: we fight how we are trained to fight.

The questions for me have to do with why I have to reconcile for myself that a foul was called, a point deducted.  I wonder about how I have not changed.  Why do I still prefer to lose over calling Foul?  How absurd of me.  But yet those feelings are there.

I think about my many nephews and nieces.  I wonder what I have taught them.  Share.  Give.  Be considerate.  Play fair.  Sounds like good teachings.  But really what I say without saying is:  Share (so that other kids have more time with your toys than you do yourself);  Give (so that others have more than you have);  Be considerate (think of others before thinking of yourself);  Play fair (even when others are being unfair to you).

I do not know when I will get to play basketball again but I hope it happens in the near future.  I am going to practice calling foul when a foul occurs.  I am going to practice feeling okay about it.  Maybe I will get this chance with one of my nephews or nieces.  Maybe I will teach them by example that playing fair means being fair to yourself also.