My daughter be jammin'

I blame myself. I was the one that took up SCUBA at the ripe old age of 54 and encouraged my offspring to take up the fun and adventurous activities while they were young and their bodies had not yet put one foot on rigor mortis and the other on a banana peel. First of all, most parents recognize that their children generally take their advice about as often as the U.S. Congress gets anything worthwhile accomplished. Which is never.
Even so, I thought, well, the kids are smart, both college graduates and Melanie, has spent more time and money on education than God. Surely, my thinking was, they will take up something more strenuous than text messaging and get out there and get into physical activity. I knew that my intelligent, fun loving children would have the sense not to get into something like being money couriers in Baghdad, or go duck hunting with Dick Cheney. No they would never do anything dangerous. I am of course, a total moron!
Melanie, aka Dr. LaForce, called us to proudly announce, not that she is expecting our grandchild, no nothing so mundane as that, but that she is, and I hope everyone is sitting down, going to play on a Roller Derby Team. Get it? That's ROLLER FREAKIN' DERBY! For those of you too young to remember or those old enough but whose brains have been fried by recreational drug use, roller derby is a "sport" where teams of roller skaters fly (and that is somtimes literally the case) around an oval track. The object of the "game" as I understand it is to skate as fast as possible, while rearranging the various anatomical features of the opponents all the while. The first team to make most of their opponents look like a painting by Dali wins.
Is it me, or does someone else out there think this is a tad, uh, risky? First of all, anyone who knows anything about skating knows that the whole premise was dreamed up by someone with two basic characteristics. They were:

1. A guy.
2. Blowing somewhere between three times the maximum legal alcohol limit and dead.

A possible third characteristic may have been he was either a frat president or a phys ed major. I mean think about it. Who else would be sitting around one day, after consuming large quantities, and come up with the major brainstorm of "I know, let's put wheels on shoes and see what happens. That should be fun"!
To give you an idea of how much "fun" this roller derby stuff can be is, Mel sent me an email seeking advice. Was it "How do I get in shape for this"? Or "How do I keep my balance while some 300 pound gorilla is treating my face like her own personal game of whackamole"? No, she asks "Hey dad, do you know where I can get some disability insurance"? DISABILITY FREAKIN' INSURANCE! Are you kidding me? She's not even 30 for God's sake!
But, that is the price you pay for being a parent. You love, nurture and teach your kids not to go out and do anything stupid and the next thing you know, they're getting married. Just kidding Dave. However, this is confusing, I don't know what to say to my kids anymore. I was thinking of recommending more education to my son, but he is liable to run off and go to law school or something.
I just need some time I guess to get used to this. I got used to the kids leaving home, moving to Chicago, and to some extent, body piercing and tatoos. I want to be supportive of my children even when they decide to do things that make my own skin crawl. Like eating sushi. Anyway, be careful out there and know that your mom and I are behind you. We damn well aren't going to be participating, but we're behind you.

For anybody interested her team is the Windy City Rollers www.windycityrollers.com/league/


Love
Dad