"There's some oatmeal out there in the kitchen for you if you want it." I didn't. "I'll stick with cereal, but thanks," I replied while rubbing the last vestiges of sleep from my eyes. Today was the first day of a two-day soccer camp hosted by several British soccer players. No big names, but for an 8-year-old, everyone taller than you is cool so I was noticeably excited.
When I sat back down at the table, he took the opportunity to pester me in my sleepy state. "When you're done eating, we'll head over to the field."
After finishing my bowl of cereal a few minutes later, we headed to the car. Minutes after that, I was getting out of the car at the park, grabbing water and my soccer ball from the back seat.
"Have a great day bud, I'll be back to pick you up around 4."
"Okay, I'll see you then." I replied, beginning to jog over to the group of kids.
We started with some dribbling drills, running with the ball through a tight slalom of cones. Then we moved onto passing drills and the three-man weave. The ball control drills continued the whole day, with the coaches encouraging us along the way. It's hard to convince kids that passing skills are more important than shooting prowess, but the coaches stuck with it until we fully understood that soccer is a team sport. Tomorrow, they promised, we would work on shooting and round out the camp with a large scrimmage.
True to his word, when 4 o'clock rolled around, my dad was waiting in the parking lot.
"How was it?" He asked as I closed the door behind me. "Good. We're playing a scrimmage tomorrow to finish camp, but we're all supposed to bring a flag from a country that plays soccer. I'm supposed to bring a flag from the Dominican Republic."
"Okay, are you supposed to make it or buy one?"
"The coach said painting it on like a white towel or something was fine."
"I've got some old modeling paint that might work."
And so our evening plans had been made. After dinner, my dad cut up a white undershirt to make a rectangular canvas for the flag. We sat down at the table, laid out some newspaper and began to paint the flag. He had some old paint he used in modeling scenery, but it was in glass jars and the paint had hardened around the rim, making them difficult to open. When we finished painting all of the blue on the flag, I went to return the paint to his craft chest while he started opening the red paint. Upon my return I noticed that he had spilt paint all over the table and appeared to be trying to wash it off his hand with a dish towel.
It took several seconds to realize that the glass jar had broken as he was trying to open it, slicing the web between his thumb and index finger on his right hand wide open. What I thought was paint all over the table and his hand was actually blood. We were the only ones at home, so he told me to run over to our neighbors and ask one of them to drive him to the hospital.
I sprinted out of the house and across our lawn to the next house over, knocked somewhat frantically on the door. Carrie, the teenage girl that lived there answered and I breathlessly tried to explain that my dad had cut his hand pretty bad and couldn't drive himself to the hospital. She followed me back over to our house and we all got in the car to go to the hospital.
We got to the hospital and my dad got stitched up pretty fast. Twelve years later, the scar is barely noticeable. While the incident left little impact on my dad, that day I faced the startling realization that he was not immortal.
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