This past Sunday, Beau and I took the kids to Miles City to watch our multi-talented nephew, Nate (a sixth-grader, pictured), play in the Cowtown Classic junior high basketball tournament.  This annual tournament brings in young teams from all over the state for a weekend of basketball games played on every court in town.

The experience brought back a lot of memories, because I remember very well playing in the Cowtown Classic when I was in junior high.  Back then I thought I was pretty.  Big.  Stuff.  It’s laughable now, but I truly thought I had basketball, and life, all figured out.

I’m past 30 these days.  And watching my nephew and his peers playing basketball this weekend, I couldn’t get past the feeling that they all seemed very… fresh from the womb.  (Whatever that means.)  Just kids.  Just playing.  Not setting any world records.  Just being normal.

And I realized fully (Yikes!  For the first time?) that when I played in the Cowtown Classic back in the mid-’90s, I too was fresh from the womb.  Just a kid.  Not doing anything great.  Just doing.  Probably causing my coach to bang his head on his clipboard.

Funny how your perspective changes.  That was about twenty years ago.  I wonder if in twenty more years I’ll look back at being a 33-year-old writer and wife and mother and think:  Back then I thought I had life all figured out.  But I was really just fresh from the womb…

© Tami Blake