Kid Stuff

My twin daughters, Julia and Grace, were born naturally, meaning Vanessa didn't use any drugs - not even Advil. We dropped a stick in her mouth and let her bite down and scream like the dickens until both babies were sucked out, vacuum style, with bullet-shaped heads. When she recently overheard me complain about the pain I felt in my arm last April after my elbow tendon decided to go on a season-long strike, she laughed at me. "You don't know pain," she said. Maybe, but at least she had something to chew on at her moment of maximum vulnerability.

I've tried to become more involved in Julia and Grace's lives over the past seven months. I couldn't throw a ball for a while, which I'm best at, so I needed to focus my energies somewhere else. Unlike my dad, "Red" (quotes his) Scott, who's started and failed at more ventures than pitches thrown in an extra inning game, I don't share his desire to be involved in everything. If Al Gore "invented" (quotes his) the internet, then "Red" Scott was the first to use it to lose a buck or two. With that knowledge about me, you can understand how difficult it was for me to start attending high school volleyball games.

I remember when I could get around and, while I'd be recognized, it wasn't so big a deal that people decided to film me with their cell phones as I bought Advil for Vanessa (she'll take it now if she gets a paper cut). What do they do with the photos, the movies they take? Did Google spend a billion dollars for YouTube because of crap like that? Ten, eleven years ago, when "Red" Scott could still lose money on physical businesses like his fashion line (Sock-A-Doodle-Doos, with little chicken heads attached to the heals of a pair of tube socks), if someone wanted my picture, they'd ask and we'd both smile for the camera. Secretive and unrehearsed these days, it's a good thing I wear my bathrobe when I walk out on my driveway to pick up the morning paper.

So you can get a sense of my apprehension when I attend Grace's JV volleyball games. I get into the gym, usually midway through the first period. (I arrive late because I forget today is a game day.) One head, then another, then in batches of twenty, turn my way. I see their lips move.


Some of Them: Think he could've afforded a watch?

Me: What did I miss?

More of them: He got fat.

I grab my slab of space and park my butt midway between the top and very top of the pullout wooden bleachers. The higher I go, the fewer eyes look down upon me. Plus, Grace doesn't like it if I'm too close. I make enough of a scene just attending. But when I begin to lose myself in the game and criticize the officiating, loudly, or her coach, very loudly, or the mascot - I've been around mascots for 20 years, I know what's funny and what's not - extremely loudly, it's best that I do it from as far away as possible. Vanessa once suggested I bring my baseball glove so when I rant and swear I can do it into the webbing of my Rawlings, like when I'm on the mound and I just threw a borderline strike that was definitely on my side of the border DAMMIT! I told Vanessa I bring enough attention to myself just showing up (late). Last thing I want to do is hear scoffs and snickers.


Some of Them: Wrong sport, Sport.

Me: Shut up.

More of them: He should've wiped the sleep out of his eyes before leaving the couch.


Grace is on the front line, bobbing and ready, the ball's coming her way, and... BAM! Her Morristown opposite - taller, stronger, angrier about some teenage thing - spikes the ball straight onto Grace's nose. She goes down. Her coach and assistant rush onto the floor while the angry Morristown girl trades high fives with the other tall, strong angry girls.

I'm just about to get up and make my way to the bathroom (my eyes do get a little crusty after a long nap) when Julia rushes onto the court, not to hand her sister a stick to chomp on for the pain, but to lead nine other girls into cheerleading position. I stay because: a) Julia will see me if I go to the bathroom now b) She'll be disappointed, probably, if I miss her routine and c) The perverts sitting in front of me are more overweight than me and have no intention of missing both a bloody nose, gushing violently as the coaches escort Grace to the sidelines, and a team of 15 year old girls dancing around in short skirts to something fast by Chingy.

Vanessa, who arrived sometime before me, is with Grace now, holding an ice pack to our daughter's nose. She takes turns examining Grace bleed, observing Julia do the Chingy dance, and looking for me. I wish I could hide my face behind a baseball glove right around now. I'd totally forgotten to even look for Vanessa when I entered the gym. I know exactly what happened when I did, too:


Lady Sitting With Vanessa: Should we make some room for your husband?

Vanessa: No.

Someone Nearby: He got fat.


We lose the match in three sets and Grace sits out the remainder of the contest. Julia causes a stir when one of the cheers she leads is somewhat pro-lesbian (she's upset that she has to cheer for girls, so she's taking the matter to an extreme). Vanessa finally finds me, curled up in the fetal position and sucking my thumb on the top row. She waves me down so we can get the girls home, so I push past the perverts and make a general disturbance all the way down.


Perverts: Hey!

Me: Sorry.

Everyone Else: Fat ass.


In the car, I inform Vanessa that we'll have to go back to the school later to pick up my big, yellow, expensive Hummer since we drove there separately. She looks at Grace, her nose bandaged , shirt bloodied, and Julia, chanting some T-Pain along with her iPod, then turns to me and says, "Why don't you run back by yourself. You can consider it your rehab for the day."

I rub a last particle of grit from an eye and gaze at my daughters in the rearview mirror before turning to my wife and saying, "But I forgot where I parked."

She turns toward the road, says nothing, and looks straight ahead, her teeth chomping down on an imaginary stick.