“I think the Romans must have aggravated one another very much, with their noses. Perhaps, they became the restless people they were, in consequence.”

That is exactly what I thought of when the photo above popped up in my ‘imported photos’ folder on my computer.

It’s not an original set of words to describe Gabe’s nose, and he himself is probably not aggravated by his own nose, but Charles Dickens was clearly a great observer of people and history and happenstance and – clearly – as evidenced by this quote, a very funny man.  Who had a Greek nose it turns out.

So he was probably also a racist.

And quite possibly suffered from rinophobia.

And yes I did look that last one up and it is a thing.

Okay, really it’s just someones hashtag thingie on twitter, but that person clearly is also afraid of noses.

Anyway, I was all ‘Oh my Gawd look at Gabe’s nose. Did I have an affair with a Roman that I forgot to tell JoHn about?’ when I saw that picture pop up above. And that is because I cannot remember taking that exact picture because I pretty much blanked the whole thing out.

What whole thing did I blank out?

The whole soccer game that Gabe played in the other night.

Here is pretty much what I remember:

Big game.

Long Drive.

Westfield doesn’t look anything like we remember it.

*side note, Gabe’s game was held in Westfield, Massachusetts the other night and that’s where JoHn went to college and I drove out there every weekend to see him (I was going to school at night).

Wow the parking lot is far from the field. That’s inconvenient.

Ha ha ha! The Werner family cracks me up.

Oh good we wore all the same clothes we wore the last time we won. Is JoHn wearing the same socks? Oh good he is.

Ugh. Big. Lots of lights.

Oh this referee is nice.

Man, this crowd is rough. I wonder if that guy is drunk.

Oh my Gawd there’s the whistle.

Don’t hurt my baby!

Goal!

OHMYGODANOTHERONE!

We won!

Lots of pics and hugging.

Mmmmmm this Wendy’s chocolate and vanilla frosty is good.

I cannot believe I just spilled it all over myself.

That’s it.

That’s all I remember.

And, yes, I did spill a partially melted Wendy’s frosty all over myself, just as our two-hour drive back home was getting underway.

Oh! And I remember I had fun.

But I don’t remember that I was actually having fun during the game.

I had retroactive fun.

Which kind of flies in the face of my stunning ability to live in any given moment, doesn’t it.

This is not lost on me.

And is pretty much relegated to sporting events.

Like, I love to watch football on Sundays (not so much on Mondays or Thursdays though and I’m probably going to have to send a note to the league about that).

But mostly I putter around so that I don’t have to watch the bad bits.

Like, when Brady gets sacked, I’m happily pulling buffalo chicken dip from the oven.  But when there’s a great run down the field, count me in! (Also rewind it so I can see it again if I covered my eyes just in case the guy is taken down from behind on the way).

So, you get it right?

I mean, if I can barely hack watching the ups and downs of a team of guys I barely know…

Right.

How the hell am I going to watch my own kid play?

Especially when the ability to just leave the room and putter around in my kitchen making buff chick dip isn’t even possible.

And since I can’t relocate my oven to any given soccer field, I take my camera.

Then I can wander all over the place and take pictures and have this little barrier between me and the actual game.

Sure, there’s no ability to rewind what I miss (and so I have JoHn describe it to me in excruciating detail, when it has already happened, so I can handle it).

So the past few games of Gabe’s have been big.

Massachusetts has 352 high schools.

They’re split into four regions for sports – North, South, West, and Central.

I dunno what happened to ‘East’. Maybe they were rinophobic racists just like Charles Dickens and got banned from MIAA competition.

But anyway, 352 schools (I looked it up).

And I don’t know how many teams are in each of the Divisions (1-4) but there will be champions in each of them.

Like, tonight.

Because tonight….

Is State.

Which I will go to.

And take lots of pictures.

And be proud, if not completely present.

But I know that this is going to be a ton of fun, and I will be laughing and cheering and I will realize that I did have fun…

Retroactively.

Go G-D!

And, of course, the significance is not lost on me.

Gabe is a senior.

This is his team.

A team of kids he has played with since his little soccer shorts covered the tops of his socks.

They ‘should’ never have gotten here, this hodgepodge group of kids… not a group of superstars, but a group of friends.

But they did get here.

All the way here.

So I will be present, in one very specific way, through the whole dang thing. I will recognize what this all means, win or not.

Have a great last game, kid.

Thanks for readin’.

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