Tales from the Blue Wendigo

Two squares, two halves of the field, separated to do battle, for honor and glory. We stand here, our rag-tag little army comprised of seven to seventeen year olds. We stand on the back line like sprinters, waiting for the whistle, the balls on the center line, waiting like shiny little easter egg surprises, two nerf footballs and three nerf round balls, 3″ in diameter.

Further across the way stand the parents, the providers of my safety, my house, my sustenance, my aunts and my uncles. However, they look different, a dangerous glint in the eyes, something is different.

The whistle sounds, we kids sprint with all our youthful excitement, trained on the playgrounds of America, we fly across the field, confident in our seizing of the nerf projectiles. But something is not right. The parents move with uncanny swiftness. Realizing that we will not reach the line in time, we dig in our heels and back-pedal like madmen. Those that had committed too much went down with alarming alacrity. Three had fallen within seconds of the whistle, granted we outnumbered the parents five to one.

There was no time to mourn, the parents moved liked ghosts our feeble attempts sailed past wisps of where the parents used to be.

The parents brought down pain like gods throwing lighting. Images of Zeus, Odin, and Thor went racing through my mind. Kids were falling left and right. I could see a parent holding two nerf balls in one hand and watched as he hurled them with such velocity that they blurred in flight. The nerf balls split in two like some wicked spell cast upon us and I watched as another kid went down in utter dodgeball humiliation.

Groin shots, head shots, dual hits, they called them like Babe Ruth pointing out home runs. I wanted to avert my eyes, but the carnage mesmerized me.

We huddled at the back line, using each other for shields, all loyalty gone out the window. We watched and waited for darkness to descend.

Okay, so that’s not exactly how my seven year old daughter saw it. In fact, i don’t know how she saw it, but i can only imagine, at seven years old, how scary a stupid nerf dodgeball game could be when facing off against the parents.

The truth of the matter is this. My daughter was the last one left standing with three adult males on the other side. We could have riddled her with nerf balls like a 1920’s gangland shooting. But instead, we let her win and faked utter incompetence.

The children chanted her name, hoisted her upon their shoulders and celebrated the day they brought the gods to their knees.

Jason