The last few days I have been putting the touches on my main college essay. I wrote it about my journey as a referee. Although since it has to be around 500 words, It just focuses on one story. A story about one of my early games about 5 years ago that didn’t turn out so well. But anyway, tonight I was sitting on the couch talking to my parents about the essay and about being a referee. And while we were talking about the difficulties of it, I said this:
“When you learn to be a referee, they tell you to keep your whistle at your waist. So when you see a foul, you have at least one second to contemplate whether you are actually going to call it or not while you bring your whistle from your waist to your mouth. And for a new ref, that one second can be terrifying. Anybody can memorize the rules of the game. What a referee does is decide based on the context of the game whether something should really be called. It is in that one second where you prove whether or not you are a referee.”
Both my parents looked at leach other, and told me to start writing. And tonight my main essay took a new turn. Just off of a dinner conversation.
Some kids have “Ah Ha” moments when they type, others have them over dinner.
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So today was my first varsity game. For those of you who do not know, I don’t play any varsity sports. No, I am a high school soccer referee. So when I say I had my first varsity game, I mean for the first time I officiated a soccer game where the players were either my age or maybe a little older. And the game was great. I initially got a few weird looks from the players and coaches when I stepped on the field (They had never seen a 17 year old varsity ref, they probably had never even seen a 37 year old varsity ref). But my calls spoke for themselves. After 10 or 15 minutes it didn’t matter my age. The calls that needed to be made, were made. And the game was a success. It has been 6 years since Jerry Fischoff came up to me and asked me if I wanted to become a travel referee. Now I am here. And I still have a ways to go.
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I have been a referee for 6 years now. It has completely changed my life. So this summer I finally convinced my brother to certify as a referee as well. And since then I got him all the top gear, took him to watch my games, and even ran through some game simulations with him. Anything to get him ready.
Now to anybody who thinks being a referee is easy, you are out of your mind. It’s really easy to yell at the ref when your sitting in your lawn chair, or better yet, your couch while watching the game on TV. The reality is, officiating is tough. Your decisions need to be spot on and they need to happen instantaneously. And as you climb ages, your margin for error declines significantly. Which is why it has taken me this long to get to Varsity (my first varsity game is tuesday, ill keep you updated on that after it happens). But yesterday was dan’s first day. And he did great. I mean, not great like he could do U15 tomorrow, but great as in a lot better than me on my first day. Now in my defense, he is 15 and I was 11 my first game. But anyway, back to this kid. He was great. And the first thing he said after his first game was “this was harder than I thought” he later told me that he originally thought it was going to be a cake walk, and boy was he wrong. I’m not going to go into real details about why he was good or bad just because I want to wait a few weeks until he gets better. Plus, I’m writing this at 11:53pm and im tired.
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I have a dog named Kobe. His name is kobe because the breeder named him cody, but I thought they named him kobe. So I just kept calling him kobe and eventually the name stuck. Well anyway Kobe (golden retriever) is an awesome dog. He is unbelievably obedient. To the point where not only does he listen to what we say, but he watches our movements and learns from them. Basic instances, he knows come, stay, and sit. But it goes further than that. For instance, when he hears the word “treat” he runs to the treat bowl. When I say “get out of here”, he leaves. And today when I took his leash and started stretching my legs, he did something really cool. He started stretching his back legs. He saw me stretching and he knew he was going to be walked. So he stretched his legs. I thought that was awesome. And that’s my post.
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One of the ways I am preparing for school is actually preparing from a teacher’s stand point. Just a few days ago I sat down with an old teacher Mr. Josh Block. Actually we met at a Starbucks. Anyway, this year I am assistant teaching Mr. Block’s robotics class, a class I took sophomore year and absolutely loved. So we met and started to plan the year. And honestly it was awesome. Since I had already taken the class I had seen what worked and what didn’t. So we started planning. And we made some core changes to the program. Changes that would force kids to learn instead of having the answers put right in front of them. Changes that will force the students to think critically. And it felt right. I love working with technology and it felt right being able to show kids how it worked. And I can’t wait for that class to start.
For the most part I don’t have a lot of emotion towards people and objects. Not sure why, I just don’t. But one of the things I do truly love is my camp. While I was at camp (June 30th-August 31st) I took care of some homesick kids since I have been at this camp for years and the owner trusts me with new kids. One of the first things I would say to them was that I was the most homesick person they would ever meet. “You have no idea how homesick I get when I leave camp” I would say to them in hopes of getting a smile out of them. But it’s true. And it took me being home for 4 days to truly figure it out. And here is how I did; Since I have been home I have only wanted to do 3 things. The first is see shows, just like the ones I played in at French Woods. The second is simply the fact that the only people I have been communicating with are from french woods, and the only people I have gone out of my way to see are the ones I was with at french woods. The last was harder to figure out. One of the things I like to do is race. And the one thing I have been doing the past few days is racing Go-Karts. now let me be clear, I am not going to six flags and racing bumper cars. I race at a place called Grand Prix New York. GPNY uses 6.5 horsepower karts, and my track times calculate and average speed of 32 MPH, which puts a top speed at around 37 MPH. So in short, I love to race. But what connects to FWF is the fact that one of the things I loved to do and constantly did at FWF was drive Gators, which were maintenance vehicles which also could go relatively fast if you drove the right vehicle. So at french woods I loved the shows, the people, and the driving. And now that I’m home, subconsciously I only want to do activities that relate to what I loved at French Woods. In other words. I am homesick. And there is no other way of putting it.
But I never like to end these posts on a bad note. Because another thing that happens over the summer. As some of you know, one of the biggest impact on my life has come through my experience as a referee. And I guess some people caught on. Because over the summer my younger brother dan certified as a referee. And I was so proud to hear it. Dan and I are very different, but in my opinion, being a referee is an experience with numerous rewards. So not only has dan learned the rules of the game, but he has since learned much more. His first game should be next week. And there is no doubt in my mind that he will do great, and that I will be watching every step of the way.
