women in sports

This last weekend marked the end (finally) of the Rugby season in my village. I look forward to that every year, as I work in the local bar, and do get tired of the drunken idiots from the rugby club pinching my butt as I work and urinating on our door. On Saturday night the local rugby club had their annual prize giving at our bar as we sponsor their club. I had to work, much to my disgrace, but cash is not exactly flying into my wallet these days, so of course I agreed.

About half way through the evening, most of the wives/girlfriends of the guys at the event had drifted away from the drunken crowd of men and were leaning on the bar chatting to the four of us who were working. We were all pretty unenthusiastic about the event and it was when one of the women mentioned that it might be nice if the women who attended the damn thing were actually included and spoken to, that I asked why we don’t actually have any Women’s sports teams in our village, other than one Netball team, and why don’t we have a women’s rugby team, soccer team, cricket team, when there were so many men’s sports teams playing for our village each week. Most of the Women sitting at the bar laughed loudly and wished me good luck with that one, as most of the time we are barely allowed to stand on the sidelines let alone participate and actually play. But a few of the younger gals expressed interest in being able to play some sort of sport.

It’s funny but considering how much time I’ve spent in rural and farming areas in Africa, this was the first time I had spent any time traversing rural Ohio. Of course it is easier to happen upon real rural locations in Africa, but for all I have heard and said about Ohio being a farming state I had managed to remain removed from it. Rural Ohio spoke to me only of cornfields and ignorant, racist hicks and I had had little reason to go and find out if I was wrong.

As we drove by the thousand and eleventh isolated farmhouse we noticed an older man sitting on a piece of building material. He was catching for a girl, a daughter or sister, a typical clean-cut Ohioan, clad only in a sports bra and athletic shorts.