Soccer Friends

My daughter just had a sleepover at our house with three of her friends. Aside from the fact I can sleep through a series of high pitched squeals capable of inducing spasms in a dog of questionable constitution when my exhaustion level passes from lethargy into comatose, I learned a couple of important things. First, those girls are as fun as they are exhausting. You haven’t lived until you’ve driven around four girls singing in unison, dancing in their seats and discussing llamas. Who needs the Eiffel Tower? I experienced a brand new culture in the SUV.

Second, I am now completely sure I do not, in any significant way, understand the female psyche. Don’t get me wrong. I get llamas, seeing as how I have a goat obsession and all. And I know girls like to sing and dance, though the gusto involved was an eye opener. The head shaker came in a dichotomy hard for a boy to digest.

These girls are soccer friends, and serious players, so naturally they eventually broke into a pick-up game. A boy gets this. The game was remarkably physical with slams and bruises passed out liberally. A boy also gets this, but is more than mildly surprised to see girls behave this way. I don’t know why I was surprised. I’ve seen these girls go at opponents the same way. I guess I somehow expected them to be dainty with their friends. That wasn’t happening, and I don’t think it even crossed their minds. They also did all this while laughing and smiling with one another. A boy does not in any way get this. For boys, there would be punches, forgiveness and food. The girls skipped the punches and forgiveness, went right on smiling and laughing, and then devoured the food like sharks in a feeding frenzy. As if this was not strange enough, at one o’clock in the morning, they were discovered in the bathroom doing each other’s hair. Color me confused, and more than a bit concerned I haven’t paid enough attention to my hairstyle.