December 2006

My wife, daughters and I,  headed north to Fort Wayne, Indiana for Christmas.  As a first year teacher, this is my first Christmas Break…very nice.  The fact that we are spending a great deal of it with my wife’s family…potentially not so nice.  I’ve got a whole mental notebook full of ways I wish my in-laws would behave, and ways I wish they would stop behaving.  I wasn’t sure how I was going to make it through, but I was going to try. 

Enter Texas Hold’em . 

My brother-in-law has become a self described poker expert.  “I’ve read two books,” he kept telling us as he explained the game.  Somewhat reluctantly, I pulled up a chair around the table.  Four hours and a few Christmas cookies later, I was wrapped up in one of the best Christmases I’d had in a long time.  I’m not sure how it happened or why it struck me, but somewhere mixed in with the thrill of betting fake money, bluffing, and watching my wife destroy everyone, even her “expert” brother, I realized something pretty amazing.  These people, sitting around this table are who they are.  I’ve always seen them as quirky, opinionated and often times annoying.  But it’s not like I’m God’s greatest gift to the family… well… okay, I’m not.  I began to see everyone as uniquely designed, talented, full of life and love and still somewhat quriky.  But all I am supposed to do is accept and love them, just like they have done to me.  I don’t have to change them into what I’d like them to be.  I just get to appreciate who they uniquely are.  So maybe it was the giddiness of throwing around poker chips, or the glass of Soft Red from Oliver Winery, but I’m gonna chalk this one up to the continual, always patient and accepting love of Jesus and the Christmas spirit, teaching me to play the hand I’ve been dealt.  

Choose to believe something different.    

“Basketball and coaching are a part of who I am”

I wrote this phrase as part of an entry from last summer. Check out Coach Shanklin…

So like I said, it’s a part of who I am. I’ve coached college, high school and middle school players. This week, I stepped up to my biggest coaching challenge yet… 4 and 5 year olds.

Wow!!!

Tonight we had our first practice. Like a good coach, I spent some time putting together a schedule for our one hour of honing our skills and preparing for our first game this Saturday. I diverted from the schedule after the first two minutes. There were seven kids at practice tonight, but it felt more like thirty. 

 Have you ever seen the herding cats commercial?  Yeah, it was kind of like that.

“Coaching 4 and 5 year olds, don’t let anyone tell you it’s easy.  Anyone can coach a teenager, holding together 7 kindergarteners in a gym with four basketballs, that’s a whole ‘nother thing all together.  It ain’t an easy job, but when you shout “come to the circle” and the all run in and pile on top of you, ain’t a feeling like it in the world.”

So we can’t really pass the ball, and dribbling, not so much.  We only had one kid cry, he was also the one that had to go to the bathroom in the middle of practice.  We can growl really well when we play defense, and everyone made at least one basket.  But maybe the best moment was the walk out to the car, and my daughter Gracie, who was looking pretty cute in her pink Chuck Taylor high tops, grabbed my hand and said, “Daddy, you are a great coach.”

Choose to believe something different.