we have a team

Whenever we go out as a family, we inevitably get the “Oh, you have a team!” comment.(Not being super familiar in American sports, I stand confused as to what kind of team we actually have: some people affirm us a basketball team, some count enough heads for a football team and others declare a baseball team. So either The Tribe moves so much it is hard to get an accurate head count, or many of our spectators are not very familiar with American sports either? I guess the former is more probable.)

I, however, usually inform the observer that what we really have is a Demolition Team. My comment is more often than not met with blank stares: A what…? Surely these sweet boys would never… They are too small to swing a tool of mass (I mean much)destruction… Destroy what…? I never explain. If they have not seen or experienced it, no words will convince them. Because you see, our boys do not need tools for mass destruction. They are born already equipped with hands and feet… and that 3 ½ lb thing balancing on top of their shoulders that is occasionally consulted - to determine who wins the “did-most-damage” trophy of the day.

Now in their defense: I do not think they typically plan the demolition. It seems to me that they just find themselves in the midst of it – not knowing how it started, why it started, or who started it. Because put a tool (and I use the term very loosely for anything in their possession is likely to become a tool) in their hands, and you have potential ruin.

Our friend, Mr. Wick Jackson, understands… and he is rooting for our Team! He assures me that this natural tendency towards shattering and scattering [stuff around] is a good thing. It is “By-Design”. It is their job. So he took the title of Team Manager upon himself and volunteered to direct the accustomed higgledy-piggledy demolition into constructive destruction.

He gave them a coach (Coach Glen Head,)

he gave them equipment ( hammers)

and he gave them a playing field (an old brick chimney hiding in the walls of our house.)

The aim of the game was simple: destroy it.

The rules were few: do wear shoes and do not throw bricks at each other.
(click picture to enlarge)

I watched with a smile – the first time ever I watched with a favorable facial expression - as they devastated something. I smiled because my assessment has been right on (and, ahem, it is good for a mother's self-esteem to be right sometimes, regardless of what she is right about): they are professional Obliterators. And I smiled because they were really good at it. And I smiled because it was obvious that they were created to do this. And I smiled because they loved it. And I smiled because the men coaching them enjoyed it. I smiled as they knocked and hammered and banged and thumped and bashed and slashed that chimney down all the way to the dust of the foundation.

And then I stopped smiling.

Game over.

No more chimney.

No more playing field.

Big Problem... they had tasted victory. They had pumped muscles. Adrenaline was oooozing out of their pores. They were hot and wired. They wanted more. Yikes! Now what Mr. Wick Jackson?

We do have a team: a Demolition Team. They’re good, they are ready, they’re available, they’re free – you want them?