No fun at all
I’m a terrible sport; it’s tempting to say “worst sport, ever,” but I’m trying to avoid superlatives (”best” and “worst” just play into the psychosis). As evidence, I cite a family vacation from years ago:
We were somewhere with a beach, and I was probably about five or six. I remember challenging my mom to a race, and I remember beating her. Well, many years later, this episode come up during dinner (actually, I think she was counseling me to tone it down with my own, as-yet-unborn children), at which time my mother revealed she’d let me win.
“No, you didn’t.” I stammered. I won, fair and sqaure. A six-year-old child, I out-ran a women in her mid-thirties: sure. I pointed to my success in high school track, how I probably had an advantage on the sand — no matter what she said, I couldn’t accept that she’d thrown the race. Honestly? I still can’t.
I sulk when I lose, and I condescend when I win. Friends have changed certain rules to oblige me (no doubling in backgammon), while completely foresaking other games (there’s been a ban on Monopoly since the late-90s). I haven’t played tennis with my sister in fifteen years, not since I made her cry one summer. She was my doubles partner.
To my mind, (a) the point of engaging in any competition is to win, and (b) everything is competition — hell, I even voiced concerns about starting a diet with Lis. Of course I sulk after a loss; and as for condescending to my opponent(s)? The harder I try not to, the more condescending I sound. Back in high school, I got around it by refusing to speak during soccer games — though this labeled me cocky and stand-offish.
(There was one incident when I screamed at my coach during a match, calling him stupid and telling him to mind his own business. My own team’s coach. When a bystander asked why he allowed it, the poor guy just shrugged and said, “At least he cares.”)
I don’t enjoy behaving like this, but I don’t know how to act otherwise — and that’s neither an apology, nor the last word on the matter; I’m just trying to express how helpless I end up feeling. At twenty-nine, it’s not often (it’s never) that I play soccer, or tennis, or race people down beaches, but I am in a fantasy baseball league.
These guys are my friends — at least, I consider them my friends, and hope they say the same of me. We’re spread out across the country, so this league is the venue in which we interact daily, from March through September, accompanied by related emails. So, to clarify, there’s little or no face-to-face interplay: it’s all written down to be read, and that’s where I cause the most damage.
Everyone banters with everyone else; everyone trades gibes, and taunts, and boasts. I hear all this, and think I’m contributing to the chorus — only, I constantly cross the line. To my ears, it all sounds the same, so I either respond with (a) that’s not fair! there’s a double-standard!, or, once I’ve calmed down, (b) holyshitwhatdidIsay?!
It’s like being immersed in a foreign culture. You offer to shake with your right hand, deeply offend your host, and think, Note to self: don’t use right hand — but it’s unlikely you appreciate the mores that make it so. So, while you’re trying to remember not to use your right hand, you sit in the wrong chair; now you’ve got two things on your list never, ever to do again — but the list keeps growing, because you’re responding to their reaction, rather than considering your provocation.
Occasionally, I’ll push someone’s buttons and never hear about it. Hurt feelings are expressed to everyone but me (and, really, what makes me privy?), and I go on like nothing ever happened, and I shorten that friendship by a matter of days, weeks, or years. Because, eventually, I won’t be forgiven — and while it’ll seem like a sudden, inexplicable rift to me, that will be that.
So, what do I do? Frankly, I’m nervous this post will offend people further. That it’ll seem condescending. That it’ll sound like I’m making apologies without working to modify my behavior. It’s maddening, and it practically drives me to tears, because the last thing I want to do is hurt anyone.
Clearly, I have to behave better; just as clearly, I hope, it’s not my intention to offend anyone. I have to ask my friends — and the folk in this fantasy league, in particular — to bring it to my attention when I go too far. Even while I’m policing myself, I can show greater improvement if I’ve got some feedback. And if my antics have convinced anyone that I’m a pathological poor sport because I take pleasure in it, or because I just don’t care? Then, I guess, it’s already too late for apologies.
For that, I’d be most sorry.
