I smell awesome

[dragonlady7]

I started saying this a couple years back, at derby practice: "I smell awesome." It started out as sarcasm, but grew into defiance; you don't smell that awesome by not doing awesome; i.e., if you're just coasting, you're not going to stink as bad as I do by the time I'm done being awesome.

But just now I leaned my head in my hand and OH wow, do my hands ever stink like wristguards. If you don't know what wristguards smell like (and I suppose there are a lot of people in this world for whom that's not a part of their daily existence-- weird!)... You know how feet smell different from any of the rest of your body? Wrists do too. They don't smell like feet. They don't smell like armpit. They don't smell like knees or elbows (which also sweat something awful and have their own unique stench). They are to the rest of your body like your feet are, only somehow, incalculably, worse. It's a truly astonishingly horrible odor, sharp and musty and tangy and horrible to an indescribably alarming degree.

Ew.
OK I just had to take a break to go shower. Now I smell like peaches or something. Rock on.

I did awesome tonight, though, at least as far as my own personal goals are concerned. My team scrimmaged our league's travel team, and instead of having set lines like we did for the bout, we just sort of assembled lineups on the fly, and tried to have as many different people as possible play as many different positions as possible. It was a ton of fun, and proved to be enormously entertaining. All sorts of people jammed who rarely do; people played pivot who never do, and lots of our usual jammers blocked like crazy. It was great.
And yoouuuurs truuuly--- jammed twice! I got lead the first time, which was enormously exciting-- the blockers in the pack saw me and automatically dismissed me as just another blocker, and nobody even tried to lay a hit on me or even get in my way. So I sailed through unopposed, just on the sheer shock value: I've been blocking for four years now, and everyone knows me very well as a blocker. I got lead, beat the other jammer to the pack, got my two or three points, got hung up when they finally noticed I had the star on my helmet, and called it, woohoo.
I know the TT wasn't hitting full-on-- they were really focusing on positional stuff, and it was deadly. Don't think I think I'm hot stuff or anything. The second time I jammed, my defense did a fantabulous job at holding the other jammer just long enough to distract my opponents so I could make it through half a lap behind her; when she fell, I was able to get into the pack and get a point or two before she called it. I found myself dreading those long far solo turns, though; I get too anxious and miss my footing out there by myself and it's hard to go really fast. In the pack I'm used to blocking and had been trying to blow my way through the pack as a blocker just to be disruptive to the opposing defense, so jamming didn't terrify me that much in the pack. If I did it more, though, against full-contact opponents really out to clean my clock, I probably would be much more scared. I admit that. I didn't do all that great, it was just so unexpected, I think, that nobody really had my number.

One thing I really love about this sport is how being 200 pounds comes in such handy. It saved me twice, maybe three times; once as a blocker, my jammer grabbed onto my skirt and hauled herself alllll around a loooooonnnng corner, and I outweighed her by enough that the centrifugal force not only didn't pull me off-balance, it also didn't affect the shoulder lean I had in place against my opponent, who had been holding the front against my jammer. That wouldn't have worked at all if I weighed what the doctor wanted me to! A second time, i was jamming, and a blocker laid into me with nowhere near enough force-- I look a lot lighter than I am, and I'm sure she thought she'd hit me plenty hard, but physics is my friend. A third time, it didn't save me-- my jammer grabbed the back of my jersey and hauled so hard it spun me around and I fell, but if I hadn't had the momentum I did, she wouldn't have made it out cleanly. As it was, she was launched well before I finally lost my footing.

I didn't feel anywhere near this good at the bout we just had, because I didn't play anywhere near this well. I know exactly what it is, too: I know that the new health insurance from my new job will go into effect quite soon, and so if I'm injured badly trying something beyond my capabilities, I will suffer economically, to be sure-- I don't get paid sick days and my job requires being on my feet-- but at least, at least, I will be allowed to see a doctor, and possibly would even have coverage if I needed surgery or something drastic. Knock wood that it doesn't happen, but just the inkling of knowledge that there's a light at the end of this long tunnel of the last few years wherein I was basically totally barred from any kind of medical care has made such a difference to my belief in my abilities.
I told myself it was dumb to hold back-- more people I know have been seriously injured in warmups or silly drills or while getting dressed, compared to the ones who got badly hurt in a bout-- but I know there was definitely that huge block in my mind for years and years. It's an enormous weight lifting from my chest. I'm pretty sure I could do anything now. And it's dumb-- if I break my leg I'm pretty much exactly as fucked as I would've been before. But somehow just the magical concept of an insurance card with my name on it, a real one, that's really real, and doesn't have that Healthy NY code on it that tells the hospital that I'm paying for 99% of this myself so they should lock up the good drugs-- oh my word. What bliss. It's not even mine yet-- DM said the process is begun, there's just some more paperwork to do. But it will be very soon, and that's so much better than the hopelessness I've been facing since... when was that? well, I tried to look it up, but I can't remember. 2008 sometime. Spring of 2008 was the last time I had reliable, affordable access to medical professionals.

Oh Chita is skeevy-kneading the afghan beside me. She is the cutest.

Also Z had made dinner so there was food when I got home. And a beer. I'd be in bed now but I have to finish this beer because it's so good. Mmm. Beer.

Oh sleep. I would like to do you for a year. I cannot. I have seven hours. Go!

Comments

[kkatowll.livejournal.com]

Go! :) I will remember this when I fall into bed tonight -- like last night, precisely 7 hrs later I must get up. What is wrong with the world? Clocks, I tell you. Clocks!

[dragonlady7.livejournal.com]

For Pennsic we're getting a clock to go above the bar that tells you the day of the week. THat's all it tells you.
I want one for work too.

[kkatowll.livejournal.com]

That is awesome. I want one too. Where do you find them? Maybe I should get my parents one -- they're retired now!

[dragonlady7.livejournal.com]

I'd have to ask Nikki-- she's the one that found it for the bar! I was joking this morning that we should get one for the store, since the DM was confused this morning about what day it was.