The children played brilliantly. They passed, they ran hard, they stayed in position, and they played together. Though they dominated the entire game, they were down 1-0 at half. They scored two hustle-style goals in the second. After they took the lead, they frantically protected for the next five minutes. The stakes were very high. When the final whistle blew, they were over the moon. Flying around whooping and hugging. It was difficult to calm them down enough to shake hands with the other team.
Afterwards Manishaben hosted a very cute ceremony for all the league teams with parents and coaches all around, and medals were handed out. I forgot how exciting it is to receive a medal. The children continued to occupy cloud nine.
On the car ride home, the mood was night and day different than after the other matches. They were chatting non-stop with each other, singing songs, yelling, asking for the radio to get turned up, planning how to tell Rahulbhai the big news ("Neilsir, Neilsir! Don't tell Rahulsir we won, we want to surprise him!"). The spirit was highly elevated. All because they knocked a ball into a net one time more than another group of kids over a forty minute span. When we got back to MS, they flew out of the van straight over to Rahulbhai and the other kids to bask in the glory. The medals were shown off proudly and placed around each others' necks. It was tremendous joy.
Winning is a drug. It totally changes your mood and outlook on life. Everything in your lens is tinted with a special shine. This experience made me think about why I was never attracted to drugs or alcohol growing up. They never appealed to me, seemed irrelevant to my life and lifestyle.
It was because I was already getting high all the time on the football pitch.
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