Our Fall sports seasons are over.<\/p>\n
Usually Cross Country ends, followed a week or so later by Volleyball. Then Football goes on for a few more weeks in Kansas, especially for our hometown team. Eight trips to the High School State Championship in ten years kind of spoiled us. We\u2019ve been used to November football for so long that this year seems really odd, not being in the playoffs.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s especially bittersweet, as my oldest son is a Senior. Football isn\u2019t in the cards for college, so he\u2019s now played his final football game. Fortunately, he was the sole captain for that game, started, and had an amazing game at a new position that he started playing that week. Pretty astounding ending to his eight year football career.<\/p>\n
So last Friday, all our High School sports were over.<\/p>\n
But in the Hectic Household that didn\u2019t mean too much. By Saturday all three High Schoolers were training for their next season. The boys (Freshman and Senior) were already working out for wrestling. My Junior daughter started conditioning for track and attended an open gym for club volleyball tryouts. She\u2019ll have a tryout this weekend for a traveling team.<\/p>\n
Our youngest is still playing volleyball (with Mom as coach) in a season-capping tournament this weekend. She\u2019s also continuing with gymnastics and swimming. Those go pretty much year round, although she\u2019s opted not to participate in competitions for either. At least not yet.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, my wife and I are playing co-ed volleyball. It\u2019s just a recreational league, but our 50 year-old bodies sometimes try to act like they\u2019re in better shape than they are. Then the next day hits and we\u2019re reminded that we\u2019re getting older.<\/p>\n
Also, my wife (successfully) and I (not so successfully) workout on a very regular basis. Weights, treadmill, bike, elliptical. You name it, we dabble in it. She\u2019s much better about sticking to things, and our levels of fitness attest to that.<\/p>\n
But the point that I wanted to focus on (because I\u2019d rather ignore my inability to stick with a fitness plan…I\u2019ll beat myself up for that another day) is that my kids just jump from one sport to the next, without missing a beat.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s part of the reason that they excel. They don\u2019t ever get to the point where they lose their fitness, even a little bit. My older son, Jared, tells me that football conditioning and wrestling conditioning are entirely different…so I\u2019ll have to take his word for it. Nevertheless, he\u2019s also a decathlete, so he\u2019s fit in so many ways it\u2019s not even funny. I just don\u2019t see him sucking wind like I do when he\u2019s doing conditioning. Maybe that\u2019s difference between being 18, in the prime of your fitness and being 50 with your prime so far in the past that the \u201cmists\u201d of time are more like pea-soup fog.<\/p>\n
But all three of my high schoolers are teaching me something again. It\u2019s not about starting and stopping fitness programs. It\u2019s all about staying fit all the time. No matter what sport you\u2019re in or not in, you ought to be working towards a fitness goal all the time. Maybe I\u2019ll never get back into the shape I was at 18 (ok, there\u2019s not really a \u201cmaybe\u201d about it), but I can be as fit as I can be. Yeah, I sound like an add for the US Army there, but it\u2019s really true. There is a level of fitness that I can attain. And there\u2019s really no reason that I can\u2019t attain it, except for my own stupid self.<\/p>\n