Narrative Essay

Soccer with Maussie
-A narrative essay help to explain the abstract ideas of soccer, but is also used as a learning tool due to rich details and its ability to evoke empathy in the reader.

A few days ago I was rummaging through my father’s garage. Any time I’m over there I always offer to clean in exchange for gallon milk jugs that have been filled with loose change. So, this time it was the garage. No one lets shit pile up like my father. I spent half the day re-arranging golf clubs, fishing lures, books, tapes, books on tape, films, shoes, tools, and more golf stuff. I was almost done when I came across a box of old film reels and a projector. Turns out, it was footage of my grandfather Ab playing soccer.
My Grandpa Ab was the son of English immigrants and had often mentioned the sport, but had never been able to bestow his love of the game upon any of us grandchildren. During the depression, his family was forced to relocate to the Midwest and thus became isolated from most, if not all, overseas culture. I remember him always trying to explain the game to my grandmother Mildred. We call her Maussie.
And now as Maussie spent most of her days holed up in the east wing of a nursing home, without my grandfather, waiting with anticipation for mealtime or craft hour, it made perfect sense to watch these tapes with her. As I thought a while longer, it occurred to me that the things that really made soccer-the thrill, the suspense, the primal violence-all of these things were a stark contrast to the life my grandmother was leading. I thought of how she must sit, day after day, disengaged while watching the sun move slowly across the patch of lawn outside her window. I thought of how the only thing she lacked was mobility, but she didn’t need that to experience the game of soccer. Her age and her history, the lack of naiveté- I believed this is what made soccer perfect for her.
I arrived at the nursing home just after lunch. This is because anyone schooled in nursing home etiquette understands that it is very uncouth to impede mealtime. I walked in just in time to see my grandmother, now 4’8”, standing up, beating her cane against the window shades.
“Maussie, do you need any help…what are you doing”? [Our conversations always began with me speaking louder than normal, yet not quite shouting.]
“Just closing the shades,” she yelled back as she beat against the window some more.
There she was- the sedentary, but very ornery little lady that was my grandmother: Ninety-two-years-old and still full of most of the spunk, vitality, and aggression of her youth.
“There”. She made a slight sigh as she reversed herself backwards and slowly sat down in her lay-z-boy rocker.
I began to tell her about what I had found in the garage as I started to set up the small projector in the tiny space. Like I mentioned before, my grandpa was always talking to Maussie about the game, but I was convinced she knew nothing because most of their conversations appeared very one-sided. My grandfather was terribly good at carrying on conversations with himself. So I decided I would just let the tapes run, and take a shot at explaining the game to her:
“Okay Maussie, so soccer, there’s two teams and they play against each other. Each team has a goal, and they’re all trying to kick the ball into each other’s goals. That’s basically the entire point of the game: to get the most goals. But, they, the players, can only use they’re feet. Except the goalie: he’s the guy that guards the goal, and he can touch the ball with his hands…. but not if it came from one of his teammates, only if it’s a person from the opposite team trying to score. So, have you got that much?”
“What Lyn…”, she said my name but she wasn’t looking at me.
“What”? She was staring at me now, pleasantly but blankly, “Okay, I’ll go on then… Um. Let’s see, then-I almost forgot about the officials. The men in black uniforms; they are the referee and the linesman. The referee is the big guy. He calls all the shots, and the linesman are kinda like his assistants. Plus they let him know if he’s missed something that’s happened on the field. And sometimes, when it gets interesting, they’ll dole out yellow cards and red cards- but only if a player gets rowdy. The yellow card just tells the player to straighten up, but the red means the player is kicked out of the game. They call it being sent off. Remember this Mauss: two yellows equal an automatic red. They don’t screw around. Is this making any sense yet?”
I think she said, “Mm, hmm.”
“Grandma, can you hear me?”, I spoke a little louder this time.
“Yea,” she said as she leaned over to retrieve a blanket she had been sitting on, “I can hear you.” She continued to look beyond me. She began to rock in her chair a little. I fidgeted for a minute, thinking maybe I was being bothersome…nah, of course not. I decided to continue.
“Alright, so let’s see…there’s an attacking team, and a defending team. Both have players playing in a formation, it’s called 4-4-2 because, besides each team’s goalie, there are two forwards, four midfielders, and four defenders. But, they also call them a bunch of other things like a forward could be an attacker, because all an attacker is, is someone trying to score. And see, midfielders could be called wingers if they’re close to the wings of the field…that just means near the sidelines. The defenders are associated with even more names like fullbacks, central defenders, sweepers, and stoppers… It seems to go on and on, but basically it just means that they’re all trying to stop the opponent from getting the ball into their net… “
“This is fun, right Maussie?”, I tried to jingle myself around to get her attention.
At this point there was a pause.
“What?” She kept rocking.
Well. Okay. I looked at my watch and thought to myself for a minute. I haven’t covered any of the rules yet…
“Laaawws of the Gaaayyme!” I said in a loud choir voice as I lifted up my hands to praise Jesus, thinking maybe this might re-instate her attention, or at the very least serve as self-entertainment.
“Fouls first. Most fouls are given out because someone is acting stupid, or doing something that could-you know- hurt somebody else, that kinda thing. Then, if a foul is committed-there’s a free kick. Free kicks are direct or they’re indirect: the only difference is that the direct kick lets you head straight for the goal, and with the indirect kicks, you have to pass it to someone else before trying to score. And…also, if someone touches the ball with their hands-remember Mauss, only the goalie can touch it with their hands-that’s a foul! The other team gets an indirect free kick…sweet huh?”
Okay, so what’s next? I began to recount my story so far in my head. Well, I haven’t said anything about offsides?
So now I guess I was getting a little disgruntled. How in the hell am I going to explain offsides?
“Lyn…”
I don’t even think she heard anything I said? Well, I could start with being in front of the second last opponent thing.
“Lyn…”
No, that’s not going to work because I’m not even sure what they mean by that. Um. Or maybe just what is not offsides first, that way-
“LYN!”
“What Maussie?”
“…You know…it’s a direct free kick.”
“What’s a direct free kick? Yea, like I just taught you…a direct free kick?” I smiled at her.
“When somebody uses their hands”, she began to pet her palms, “ to touch the ball, the other team gets a direct free kick.”
As I tried to figure out what just happened, a small giggle passed over the wily little lady. She paused for a moment and then said quietly to herself, “and that’s called a fake.”