When I was growing up there were no consolation trophies. Winning was everything and not everybody got to play. Now everybody, win or lose, gets a trophy, and everyone gets playing time regardless of their athletic ability.

Due to my physical limitations, I never experienced being on a team, but I loved sports and had a competitive spirit. I lived vicariously through my cousins who were natural athletes, which made losing rare and heartbreaking. When one of my cousins lost the high school baseball championship our Senior year, I cried the entire three hour drive home. When a player from another team purposely took out my other cousin in the high school basketball playoffs, causing a season ending knee injury, I wanted blood. So did my sweet even-tempered grandma. LOL.

Needless to say I think sports are important because they teach you, among other things, how to deal with disappoint. They teach you that life can be hard, cruel, and unfair. Sports also teach that hard work pays off and is rewarding. Can you learn those same lessons through the arts and other non-sports-like activities? Of course.

What I’m trying to say is, that there are no consolation trophies in the real world. Only those who put in the work and meet expectations receive recognition and reap the rewards. I don’t mind the everybody gets a trophy, everybody plays, no one keeps score, for little kids learning the game. Whether it’s sports or learning to play a musical instrument, kids should be encouraged and focus on having fun. But sometime around the age of ten, or middle school, they should begin to learn how to deal with disappoint, develop a work ethic, and that there is always room for improvement.

Unfortunately, in our world today, sometimes being the best has more to do with status than ability or participation. I saw this time and again as a kid and later as a teacher. If a kid came from a poor family or a less than “perfect” home life, no one took much time to encourage them or give them hope for the future. In a lot of cases, they do just the opposite. Coaches pushing players so hard they end up quitting the team. Teachers looking for any excuse to kick a kid out of their class. I was one of those kids.

I was discouraged by my high school counselor from going to college. I was told that because of my physical limitations I would not make it in college and was setting myself up for failure. In sixth grade I had a teacher who made negative, sometimes degrading, comments about my physical appearance. She made her mission to point out every pimple, hair out of place, and wrinkle in my clothes. When I made an A on a test she accused me of cheating. She said, “people like you” are incapable of making good grades. The phrase “people like you” stuck with me for years. I didn’t know what she meant by it. I saw her years later in a fast food place. She said hello and asked what I was doing now. At the time I was a school Librarian. When I revealed this news, she immediately stiffened her back and said “you mean a library aide”. I said no that I was THE librarian. She sneered, “Don’t you have to have a Master’s degree to do that”. To which I said yes. Looking down her nose at me she said, “you have a Master’s degree?” As if it was some kind of joke. The remainder of our short conversation consisted of her trying to trick me into saying something she could twist into making me out to be a liar. I looked at her and saw her for what she was, a stuck up snob and a bully. It was at that point I realized what her “people like you” statement meant. I thought to myself, how dare she look down her nose at me like I was something nasty on the bottom of her shoe. I thought how dare she try to belittle me. I wasn’t an insecure twelve year old girl any more. I made something of myself, and she did everything she could to destroy my hopes and dreams for the future. She should be ashamed and remorseful, not shocked and disgusted by my success. Ones I saw her through mature self-confident eyes, and not naive and insecure eyes, I literally turned my back on her and started talking to someone else. I was not going to submit myself to such ill-mannered behavior. The best thing that came from that conversation? I got closure. There was nothing wrong with me then and there is nothing wrong with me now. SHE was the problem, not me. She was and is the undesirable one, not me.

That is my personal story. One of countless experiences I have faced and overcome through my successes and achievements. I would say that those people contributed to my success because they motivated me, but I refuse to give them the satisfaction or the credit. I believe that credit goes to my parents for never letting me give up, my sweet even-tempered grandma who cheered her children and grandchildren on and told every coach/teacher “I’m [insert name] grandma,” and two of my high school teachers who believed in me and went the extra mile to help me succeed in their classroom. Those are the ones who deserve the credit for my success. The people who built me up, not the ones who tore me down.

No I didn’t forget about God. It goes without saying that without God I wouldn’t be alive. He put my encouragers in my life. He gave me the ability to pick myself up every time someone tore my down. Every time He built me back up, He made me stronger.

You see God doesn’t care about status. My parents and grandma just wanted me to do my best and never give up. Some teachers look at a students potential and effort, not labels or circumstances.

I learned recently that some one I knew passed away as a result of COVID. I’ll call him Bryant. Bryant was kind, quiet, smart, and a good football player. To his high school football coach, Bryant was one of the “undesirables”. This coach never lifted a finger to help Bryant get a scholarship or give him the recognition he deserved. If it hadn’t been for coaches from other schools, I don’t know if he would have gotten any recognition. Bryant was the only football player from his high school to be named all-state his senior year.

Several of the coaches in Bryant’s high school were like that. They focused on the “chosen ones” and ignored all the other players regardless of their ability or potential to play the game. I don’t know if he was excluded from “the chosen ones” because he was from a poor family or because of his group of friends, or what. For whatever reason, Bryant was pushed aside by the people who should have been encouraging him and helping him pursue his dreams.

Bryant started out sacking groceries at his small town grocery store and, shortly after graduating from high school, had worked his way up to management. He went to the local community college with the help of the company who owned the grocery store he worked for. THEY saw his potential. THEY believed in him. THEY encouraged him. Bryant got his business degree, despite the lack of effort of his coaches and teachers. A few years ago he and a friend from high school went into business together and we’re doing well at the time of his death.

The lack of effort and support for kids who put in the work, who not only have potential but the skills to succeed, is one of the reasons I stopped following my hometown high school sports. My high school focused on status, appearance, and cliques. Unfortunately, I don’t think much has changed since I graduated. I still get upset about it. Especially since the “chosen ones” are now the coaches, teachers, and administrators. It’s one thing for immature teenagers to base their lives around such things as status, but adults? The adults that are supposed to be teaching, guiding, and mentoring said teenagers? They should know better.

So, I ask you readers. Is all fair in sports and school?

Until another day,

AC