You and your damn wings

"Jamal" interrupted my lunch in the teachers' lounge yesterday, asking me if the game was cancelled. It was, and he walked away, dejected.

I related to my colleagues how it's amazing to me that this kid has become the most important player on my team, after I swore last year he wouldn't play ball for me this year. See, he quit - or, according to him, his dad pulled him off the team - after five (undefeated) games last year, upset about playing time. I was mad, and took it personally, especially because I felt like his dad pulling him had a lot to do with my race and because I had to done a lot for this kid, who was then a sophomore on a varsity team. "I had sort of taken him under my wing," I explained, "and..."

And my colleague cut me off, laughing: "Yeah, you're always taking some kid under your wing... You and your damn wings. Making the rest of us look bad."

"Or sane," another one perked up.

I laughed so hard that diet pepsi squirted out of my nose.