"Forget Regret Or Life Is Yours To Miss" (RENT)

Tonight I sat in a gym along with four friends watching a few matches. I did the same thing last night and I will do it again tomorrow night. Then the following night I will gather and play some friendly games at a league open play. What is this something that inhabits so much of my life, not just on the court but also beyond the doors of the gym? The sport in question is volleyball. This sport has taken me on quite a ride, not so much by playing it but from what I learned from the experiences--a little self-discovery.

Since September 1999, I've been enjoying my life in New York--just an avid theatergoer. Some may even call it bordering on fanatic enthusiasm, especially when it came to my then-favorite show, HAIRSPRAY. My social life was the theatre. That was why I moved to New York--to be near Broadway and all its glories (as an audience member, not actor). My job and life beyond that revolved around that performance space called theatre and a fascination with all who inhabit it. You could find me at some show just about every night of the week.

But in September 2003, I began an adventure that I've been on ever since--this thing called volleyball. For a few years, I would see an ad in the Village Voice for the Big City volleyball league. "Join a volleyball team" sounded so interesting. There was a problem--sports and my body did not go together. It had been years since I had tried any physical activity. So I would take that ad and just put it off until the next time. A chance to react completely ignored. I think I lost about two years because I did not take that chance. But things happen in their own time is my belief. But what was I so afraid of in joining a new sport for fun. I remember playing volleyball with my extended family in my grandparents' yard for years. They had a small court set up on grass with metal poles cemented into the ground. It was all fun. That was what I associated with that sport--family and fun. But an organized league meant new challenges on a social and physical level, both aspects I felt completely weak in. I liked my comfort zone that I had built around me. Theatre was everything to me, and the theatre district was my playground. I mean I could tell you the character names and who portrayed them in almost every Broadway show running at that time (and I think I can still do that). I just thought finding another hobby would be cool, but a team sport was a long ago territory forgotten since middle school.

I finally got up enough nerve to go that fall open scrimmage for Big City. I remember walking through the little alley and up the stairs at High School of Environmental Studies with such nervousness and then to see so many people on and around the court, I felt maybe I was not ready for this. No. I was not going to keep thinking like that. I kept putting it in my mind that there were other people like me--beginners. That was not so bad. I got on the court, rotating, bumping, and serving like others, and made mistakes. I needed to make the mistakes to let others know how flawed I was just so they knew what they were getting if I got on their team. I waited in line to get back on a court when Anne T. came up to ask if I had a team yet. She asked me to join her team and thus the adventure began.

SCORECARD
Viewed matches:
Kevin and Jon's team (Hit It and Quit It): 2-1
Tomoko and Yumi's team (High Q Honey): 2-1
Deb and Leah's team (NY Chix): 2-1