As of Friday, it will officially be summer.
For some, that means summer league basketball and sweating one’s tail off in a hotter-than-hot gymnasium. For others, it’s the same thing, but playing volleyball.
For still more, it is participating in summer training – whether it be indoor strength training for football, summer workouts for gymnastics, or time swimming laps and sprint drills in a pool.
In short, while summer may start Friday – and for most area students, summer vacation started close to two weeks ago – there really isn’t any time off anymore. At least, there isn’t if you are one of the best of the best and playing for a competitive team.
Spring sports like baseball and softball have an easy fade as athletes transition into either American Legion baseball or summer league softball. Others, like volleyball and basketball, are simply transitioning from their “regular” offseason to their “postseason” offseason – regional and national AAU tournaments.
Some of these athletes basically go year-round on one sport – and then add other activities on top of it. At least a handful of club volleyball players I know successfully navigate the fall girls volleyball season, then play high school basketball or another sport in the spring while playing club volleyball.
Like so many sports, playing in high school isn’t enough anymore, and it hasn’t been for a while. So, rather than taking a summer vacation to Disneyland, these athletes travel to a city to play volleyball.
I’m not passing judgment. Most kids, if they are good enough to be thinking about playing beyond high school, have the dedication and talent to split their time – and do it effectively. Many enjoy participating as much as possible, even thrive on it.
It’s also not like athletes are the only ones putting in extra time outside of a prescribed season. Singers sing, actors act, academic-minded students attend extra classes … if there’s something to be done, people do it during the summer. It’s the nature of a nine-month school year. When you suddenly have three free months, you still have to find something to fill them.
And yet, looking at the nature of competitive sports and the youths participating in them, I’m beginning to wonder if what used to be fun has become more like work. Certainly there is value to putting in the hard work and getting the reward. But where do you draw the line – and how?
I’m sure many adults scoff at how comparatively easy high school students have it. Truth be told, though, I think it’s tougher being a high school student – not just the class load, but the homework, extra-curricular activities (be it sports, music or clubs), holding down a part-time job and still trying to find time to find out who you really are.
With that kind of full-time commitment to athletics – or really, any activity that requires that kind of dedication – at the high school age, how much room do you really have to find out what you love? Have you already found it in volleyball, or gymnastics, or music? Or is what you consider a love merely what you’ve come to know?
Weighty questions for a teenager, I know. But in looking at those questions, I wonder how many of these kids – and that’s what they are still, kids – miss a chance to truly enjoy what life has to offer. Can they go enjoy a summer day at the pool or a concert? What about taking an art class – just for the heck of it?
It’s questions like this to ponder when you see all the excellence developed at area high schools. That excellence comes with a price – one only the students know, and maybe even then only years down the road.
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