Encouragement vs Selfishness

I promise not to do a tennis post every night, but tonight two small stories come to mind that kind of relate to what I talk about here, so a mini-post is born from the tennis matches.

Steve was passing K, a 7th grade tennis player (girl) as he walked around the courts. She was finished with her match, so he asked her how she had done. Looking dejected, she said, "I lost 8 to 1." What do you say to that? 8 to 1 makes it hard to be encouraging. Behind her was the 8th grade top seed for the boy's team, who said, "Yes, but she was playing the County champion." Way to be encouraging!

G and M played a pair of boys from B'ville. G and M rarely communicate verbally as they play -- they just watch each other, and can tell from position on the court and body language who is going to hit the ball back. The B'ville team was not like that. The whole time, almost every other time a ball was headed their way, both members of the doubles team would say, "Mine!" All through the match, they sounded like the seagulls from the movie Finding Nemo. "Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine!" Then they would either do a very poor job hitting the ball back or miss it entirely.

G/M - 8 : Barboursville - 1 (W) (Mine Mine Mine)