The boys of summer and the Personal Outrage of Nervousness

first off I have to tell everyone, I love making titles for writing. I have more fun doing it then Tom Wolfe did in the 70's. Anyway, I have been a flaming nervous wreck sitting out a home like the doting housewife of a soldier to war (although on a signifigantly smaller scale). The Port Veritas National Slam team who I now refer to simply as the BOYS OF SUMMER because I create nicknames all the time and without thought, came into Madison like a house of fire and took third place in their first bout. I left out a detail however the team they lost too WON the whole freaking tournament in 2006 and in 2007 came in FOURTH for a first time team to compete with people at a level like that is some serious David and Goliath sh#t right there. So in the first round Goliath kicked the tar out of us but it was a learning experiance. Nate was slow with the phone pickup and the National poetry website WAS NOT UPDATING FAST ENOUGH!!! I knew they had to come out like a house of fire in the second bout or we would come back feeling like our best foot hadn't come forward.

I did finally get to speak with Nate after calling him 3 times a day and he didn't mention anything about screwing up and since he never compliments himself(GOD I WISH I COULD DO THAT!) I knew he had scored well and apparently Wil had the high score for our team in the first bout. Nate and Wil were both fine so the wheels hadn't fallen off the cart we just needed to push the cart faster. The problem is in the second round we face White Plains New York who beat us already in a practice run and LOS ANGELES who are always inside the winning circle and captained by Shihan who is the talent scout and a routine performer on DEF POETRY JAM. Shihan has that effortless conversational vibe that KILLS!!!! I'm sure his team is going to be rock solid.

Well that was a bout going on Thursday and Friday I got the update....WE TOOK SECOND!!! OH YEAH!!!! First Maine slam team in over 10 years maybe 15 and we placed above Bostons Lizard Lounge team (Who are AWESOME) and the Chicago Green Mill team(who started slam) and most of the new england teams(except War chest her Mass THATS RIGHT I SAID IT WRONG ON PURPOSE! CORRECT ME!!!!) I promise no more exclamation marks for now but I was excited because our score was very good. I didn't find out till late saturday but it looks like the final listing came out and we were 36 out of 77 or so teams. I am worn out. Sean, Wil, Juba, Jake and Nate are so pumped up I'm not sure I could create a metaphor for it. The world is just a little bit different for them now and I'm probably most excite for Sean and Jake who are so young and so talented and this is just the start for them, its like being a first year quarterback in the superbowl even when you lose it you never lose the lessons you learn from it. They'll all be back in the superbowl next year. I'll do anything I can to make sure of that.