Soccer

I’ve always loved playing soccer. The last time I played I was 14 (a decade ago). I’ve never played for a team, but my dad used to header all day with me in the garden and I used to play for hours with the garden wall, because the boys wouldn’t let me play with them. They knew I was better.

So what better way to meet girls then a round of good ol’ football every Tuesday night. There’s this little group of lesbians here in London that gets together every Tuesday in Camden to “kick around”. Their website says they cater for amateurs and professionals. I have an inkling of the kind of lesbian that would dedicate every Tuesday night to a game of soccer. I knew I’d be the femmist …

The vision I had was of me walking onto the tarmac (no space for grass fields in London), slow motion. Def Lepard’s ‘Pour some sugar on me’ is the soundtrack. I’m wearing little shorts, a tight T. All the other girls stop warming up and stare at me. They eye each other as if to say: “Check out the new hottie” and “Dibs”.

Oh … and I play a great game of soccer and they all beg me to come back next week.

That was the vision. This is what happened:

I called the organiser and asked her what I should wear. I asked her what kind of women played? I warned her I was very femme and just doing this to meet people in a fun and energetic way. I asked her again what I should wear. She giggled and said jeans would be uncomfortable to play in. Anything else would be fine.

So I looked for sexy shorts in my wardrobe and, can you believe it, I didn’t have any. Why wouldn’t I have sexy shorts? Because I think my legs are fat? Because my knees are square? Because you can go mountain biking through my cellulite? Odd.

So I wore tracksuit pants and a tight T, which I had, because thankfully, you can go mountain biking on my breasts as well.

My inkling was right about the kind of lesbians that played. And there weren’t any amateurs. Oh, and they didn’t notice me when I walked in with my soundtrack playing on my ipod earphones.

I spoke to a French lady who asked about my soccer experience while we were warming up. You should have seen her face when I told her. Then I spoke to an old British dyke who wouldn’t look me in the eye and boasted about having gone to Pride in South Africa … “but it was lo-ong ago, before democracy, before the 1994 election …” And then she made some comment like: “You’d be too young to remember,” which irritated me, so I stopped listening to her.

Then I slowly met all the others. Some were sweet, some were as shy as me, most were all soccer.

Then we started playing.

I was never offside when I played in my garden. The wall really didn’t care where I was. But French lady cared a lot and I could see she was getting irritated with me.

Also I pretty much haven’t done any real exercise in five years. And I realised this after, say, 30 minutes when my heart was breakbeating and it felt like I had a jawbreaker stuck in my throat. So I couldn’t flirt, I couldn’t even say “Good shot”, because I was wheezing. So unattractive.

Then at around 45 minutes and 26 seconds into the game, I headered the ball for the goal, just like my dad taught me to. I missed. And lost my right contact lens from the impact. I didn’t tell anyone though. Pride is a stupid thing. So I played the rest of the game trying to see out of one eye looking like Quasimodo because things were clearer if the other eye was shut. I kept bumping into this really lanky, disshevelled, shy-looking chick every five minutes because I was running skew. They probably thought I had a bad twitch.

I waited on the grass outside the change rooms, trying to soothe my wheezing with a camel light. We were all going to the pub for drinks after the game.

Then out of the bathroom came this unbelievably hot, tall, slim and handsome lesbian dressed impeccably grunge and I thought: Out of all of them, I had to pick this one to go charging into squinted and one-eyed. Great.

I had mistaken her cool for shyness. Because really cool people only talk when they have to, if at all. This is how I know I’m not cool. And the dishevelled look was grunge-punk-I-don’t-give-a-fuck. She had arrived late. That’s why I didn’t notice her before. I didn’t actually notice her until I scraped her wrist with my watch while trying to tackle her. But she didn’t even care. Because cool people don’t care when they get scraped and scratched.

On the way to the pub, I asked if I could go in tracksuit pants and takkies ("trainers, sorry") because I didn’t bring anything to change into and the organiser laughed at me and said it was the third time I had asked her a question concerning clothes.

Astrid: I hate her. Fat bitch.

Fluffy: She’s right. Who cares what you wear.

But I was in love, so I didn’t care. So Grungy Lank and I got talking at the pub. She was from New Zealand, studying in London doing her doctorate on [I wet my panties on the spot] underground music in Berlin.

She explained underground music while rolling her own tobacco. In the year 2007, can anyone tell me if there is anything cooler than a dyke who studies underground music, rolls her own fags and is on her way to Berlin (she was leaving in two weeks and wouldn’t be back at soccer ever again)? I didn’t think so. Would you spread your legs sitting there on the barstool? I would too. In fact I nearly did when she licked her rolling paper closed.

We all sat at a long table. Grungy Lank sat opposite me. And we took turns at glancing at each other when each of us wasn’t looking. Astrid was listening to French lady babbling on about her job in wines, and acting very impressed and interested, while Fluffy drooled over the way Grungy Lank blew smoke from her mouth.

Then my cell ("mobile, sorry") beeped. It was The One. “Astrid, are you at home? Will you phone me? I really need to speak to you.”

I made it home in 20 minutes (in London that’s equivalent to four) to hear The One tell me she was having such a bad day and needed to hear my voice. She didn’t ask me about soccer. I heard all about her day, though. She doesn’t deserve these privileges anymore and I just ran away from socializing with new lesbian friends and now I’m suicidal. I need to grow a backbone.

I’ll never forget the look of shock and horror on Grungy Lank’s face when I said, in a rush, that I had to go. Cool people are silent and only speak when they have to, if at all. Her lips said: “Bye. Nice to meet you.” But her face said: “Where the fuck are you going? We’re not done yet.”

Damn it. 

Soccer – three days later

At least if it was from sex it would have been for a good cause. But to pull your groin muscle during a one-off soccer game and leave unsatisfied, with no numbers in your phone, is just not worth it. Now I can’t walk.

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Read more about Astrid and Fluffy.