Man Balls, Lady Balls, Soccer Balls.
World Cup fever has swept through the country, blaring from telly screens and dominating domestic Twitter, and our little tripod family has not been left unfazed.
The Trolls and I caught our very first televised soccer match the other day and it was… a thing.
As a single mom to my two boisterous, eccentric little monsters, God and Google know I’ve done my best to keep our balls afloat. And we have many. Home Balls, and all the frills that go with it. School Balls and all the frustration that goes with that. Life Balls and all the breathing in and breathing out that keeps us going.
My needs, their needs. My wants, their wants. My sanity, their sanity. My life as the Urban Single Mom literally consists out of the balls that I juggle, my sons’ balls that I nurture and protect and the Man Balls it takes to do it all day after day, night after nights, solo.
Have I dropped a few? That would be a big, resounding yes.
How could I not? In this Game of Balls, inevitably, you net the ones you can, and brush off the ones you bugger up.
And of the many buggered up balls I’ve brushed off in the last decade of parenting the boys alone, soccer is one of them. I’ve never taken them to a soccer match.
I’ve never watched a soccer match with them. In fact, I don’t even really know how soccer works.
It’s just never been that important. Paying the bills and staying alive, on the other hand, have been. But all that changed in June 2018. Because soccer is all everyone is talking about, and that ‘everyone’ includes The Trolls. And so we planted three pairs of freezing buttocks on my mother’s couch recently and watched a soccer game.
No. I retract. We got swept up in a soccer match.
We jumped. We cheered. We lived 90 plus minutes of football glory and at the end of it all, we had this conversation.
Well! That was fun.
It sucks that Tunisia lost, though.
Yeah.
Do they always get people so happy… and then… just lose?!
Er… I don’t think they did it on purpose, babe.
Next World Cup, we should be there in person, Mom.
We can’t afford going to the World Cup, Dumb-Nuts!
Not unless we starve for the next four years, dudes.
Meh. Who needs food.
We do, of course. And because we do, I’ll be playing the Game of Balls for, foreseeably, the rest of my life.
It takes balls to live this single mom life. Big, strong, unbreakable Man Balls. This life requires hands that can fix things which break (because replacing broken things with new things cost money), legs that can walk on tar as well as gravel because sometimes the car breaks down, a head that can stretch dollars into pounds and a back that can carry your weight as well as the weight of those you love.
But it also requires Lady Balls.
Lady Balls love the unlovable, care selflessly and forgive when forgiveness is needed.
And those are the balls worth netting.
In an age of information overload, Sunrise is The Namibian’s morning briefing, delivered at 6h00 from Monday to Friday. It offers a curated rundown of the most important stories from the past 24 hours – occasionally with a light, witty touch. It’s an essential way to stay informed. Subscribe and join our newsletter community.
The Namibian uses AI tools to assist with improved quality, accuracy and efficiency, while maintaining editorial oversight and journalistic integrity.
Stay informed with The Namibian – your source for credible journalism. Get in-depth reporting and opinions for
only N$85 a month. Invest in journalism, invest in democracy –
Subscribe Now!
