Non-competitive sport? No daughter of mine is gonna play that way – time to rewrite history
SORCHA WAS in a serious fouler on Friday night. She was telling me about this spiritual wellness retreat she’s going on for the weekend and all I said was that I thought that kind of thing had gone out with the whole Celtic Tiger thing.
"In times like these," she goes, "it's a proven fact, Ross, that people are even morein need of oneness and serenity?"
I’m there, like, flicking through the brochure. Twelve hundred snots for two nights in a darkened room overlooking the corpork of Aldi in Cootehill. Maybe these are the green shoots of recovery that the old man has storted banging on about.
"Anyway," she goes, "I better go. I've got to collect Erika. Are you sureyou can look after Honor for the weekend?" I'm there, "Hey, you're talking to Daddy Daycare here." She's not letting that go, though.
"Can I remind you what happened the last time I went away? You let her watch seven hours of The Wirewith Ronan."
"Well," I go, "if you don't mind me saying, I thought you actually overreactedthat time?"
“Ross, she called me a snitching motherfocker and told me that Turtle Wells was going to bitch-slap the bright out of my eyes.” I actually laugh in her face – it’s just funny listening to someone from the Vico Road try to talk street.
“She’ll be fine,” I go, practically shoving her out the door. “Look, you just go and enjoy your, I suppose, spiritual wellness – and maybe bring back some for me, eh?” She’s in no mood for my nonsense, though.
“And I don’t want her training,” she goes.
I’m there, “Excuse me?”
"I know you've been training her, Ross – for the Little Roedeans Montessori Sports Day? You were spotted last week in Herbert Pork, timing her running laps of the tennis courts." Her sister – Alma, Orinoco or whatever the fock she's called – sheplays tennis in Herbert Pork. Sounds to me like snitching runs in the Lalor family.
I’m there, “Hey, I just want to make sure she doesn’t disgrace herself on the day. She’s the daughter of one of Ireland’s greatest ever sportsmen – there’s going to be serious pressure on her to perform.”
"Look," she goes, losing it with me, "I don't want to be left dealing with the endorphin crash when I arrive back on Sunday night. I'm serious, Ross – notraining!"
“Hey, calm down – it’s cool.”
"And as I keep telling you, the races are, like, non-competitive? They all get the same medal no matter where they finish." I end up having to bite my lip to stop myself sniggering. "Er, yeah," I go, "whatever bloats your goat."
She's there, "Now, don't forget, go up and read to her before she goes to sleep. I've left her favourite book on the nightstand." Then it's mwoi, mwoiand she's suddenly off. I listen to her Mini Cooper disappear up Newtownpork Avenue as I'm heading upstairs to check on the kid.
“Mommy’s angry,” is the first thing she goes to me when I walk into the room. It actually makes me smile – she’s definitely her daddy’s girl.
“Mommy’s not angry,” I go. “She’s just got a lot of, I suppose you’d have to say, insane ideas about the world and how it works. But there’s a thing called a recession on out there. It’s no time for serenity. And even though I don’t know know what the actual word means, I’m pretty sure it’s no time for oneness either.” I sit on the side of the bed and sort of, like, chuckle to myself. I mean, non-competitive? Hello? Is it any wonder that her shop in the Powerscourt Townhouse Centre went tits-up?
Honor goes, "Daddy, will you read me a story?" and I smile and tell her of course I will. I pick the book off the nightstand and I look at the cover. It's some black-and-white dude with a big Ronnie, then underneath it's like, The Story of Baron Pierre de Coubertin, which seems like a weird title for a children's book, although I decide to just go with it anyway. I open it up and stort giving it the old left to right.
"Pierre de Coubertin was born on the first day of 1863 in Paris, France," I go. " He was from a wealthy family, was a talented sportsman and was educated by the Jesuits. . . I suppose he was a sort of olden-day Gordon D'Arcy then!" Honor laughs. "You funny, Daddy!" See, they're great at that age.
" He is known as the father of the modern Olympic Games. It was his dream to revive the ancient games which were held every year in the city of Olympia in Greece, between 776 BC and. . . God, there's an awful lot of facts and figures, isn't there? I'm really sorry about this, Honor." So I flick forward a few pages.
" He believed in the idea that the struggle to overcome one's opponent was more important than victory itself. He expressed what has come to be known as the Olympic Ideal in a number of different ways. . ." I turn the page.
" The day when a sportsman stops thinking above all else of the happiness in his own effort and the intoxication of the power and physical balance he derives from it, the day when he lets considerations of vanity and self-interest take over, on this day his ideal will die. . ." I just freeze. I'm like, "Honor, where did you get this book?" She goes, "From the library, Daddy – in school." I just shake my head. We're paying those fockers 15 Ks a year to fill her head with this rubbish.
“What happened in the end?” she goes. “Daddy, what happened in the end?” Of course, I have to think fast. Luckily, it happens to be one of the qualities that made me the rugby player I used to be. I turn to the back page and pretend to read.
" He died friendless and penniless in a flat in Inchicore with no furniture except for the stinking mattress on which he slept and a Superser heater that didn't even work . . .
He was unrecognisable because his face had been pretty much eaten by the cats that he'd faithfully fed for nearly 10 years . . .Oh my God, hedidn't have a happy ending, did he, Honor?"
“No,” she just goes, “that was sad, Daddy.” I’m like, “Yeah – still, plenty to be thinking about, eh? Anyway, goodnight, Kiddo.”
I tuck her in, then tip downstairs. Literally 10 minutes later, roysh, I’m sitting there watching Leinster against Clermont Auvergne, when I hear this sudden boom, boom, boom coming from upstairs. And I have to just smile. She’s on her mother’s Stepmaster.
Like I said, she’s her daddy’s girl.
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