Moment of Glory

I love Frisbee and I try to pass the joy onto Chrysalis kids. One game I play with them is Moment of Glory. It is the last play of the Super Bowl and we are down four points. A touchdown would win it and here it is, a long pass, your chance for a Moment of Glory. A kid runs long and I throw the Frisbee way out in such a way that the child has to really run and stretch to catch it. If they do, my arms go up in the air as I bellow a loud Yes. However, most of the time, they don’t catch the Frisbee because these throws are not easy to catch. If they try hard but don’t quite catch it, I give an exultant groan of “Almost” and they come trotting back to try again.

My dad sometimes played something similar with us using a football. There was no Super Bowl fantasy imposed on the game (Super Bowl did not yet exist) but we would line up and run out. He would pass the football on the edge of our ability to catch it. There were many times when my fingers were able to touch the football but not catch it. Dad’s stock response was “you should have had it.” That made me feel like I had failed so that my effort was associated with not being good enough. Instead of joy with occasional moments of triumph, I experienced failing with occasional moments of adequacy. I did not want to pass that feeling on to the next generation. I want them to come back to the line eager and joyously determined to try even harder next time. “You should have had it” was in my cultural DNA but it evolved into a more encouraging “Almost.” Often when I shout it out, I think, “This is how culture improves.”