Marbles are magical, like the number 3

Tonight I went to Shamus' softball game. It brought me back to my T-ball days. T-ball was upsetting to me because I had to wear pants, which I was not fond of at the time. Also, I didn't quite understand the rules, and no one realized that they needed to explain them to me. When my coach brought me out to the field and told me to "stand here", I thought that meant that I needed to stay in exactly that place. Looking back, it seems I was aware that I could temporarily leave my assigned spot, but was worried that I would never find my way back to it, because I'm bad with directions and could have ended up anywhere. Then, I feared, my team would lose the game because of my inability to stay in one spot.

So, I created elaborate schemes to guarantee that I could find my way back. Usually, this involved drawing designs in the dirt that would allow me to identify my assign position. I would draw a picture and then step back and think, "Could that happen naturally?" and if the answer was yes, I would erase it and start again, to ensure that I wasn't distracted by any spot marker decoys. Unfortunately, this gave me a rep as the team dunce, which meant that I was always in the outfield, so I always felt like I needed a special marker. The funny thing is, had I been put at a base, this wouldn't be an issue and I probably would have actually played. Just one of the many Catch-22s that make up life. I had one day where I found a marble, and that game was the highlight of my entire T-ball career. I was running all over the place, safe in the knowledge that nature was not going to magically craft distraction marbles.

Here are some examples of markers I would draw:

This one is easy to draw, which is good, but is too easily reproduced by an evil child falling on their face. So, I would erase it and replace it with this:
Also, far too commonly found in children's t-ball fields. So I would replace it with this:
This one will work. No drawing of this caliber could be produced without significant, deliberate effort. Now I can finally get into this game. Wait, where's everyone going? Noooo, not again. Why am I so bad at this game?

After reading my blog about baby names, Shamus said to Lilliput, "If we have 7 children, I'm calling the 7th one Seven. That's our deal." And, after having dealt with a fussy Char-char all day, Lilliput said, "If you're having 7 children, it's not with me." To which, Shamus said "You could have sextuplets, and if we do, we'll just give them numbers." But I said, "What about poor Six," because you know that Six is totally going to be mocked mercilessly when the other children realize that a simple vowel substitution will lead to a wonderfully horrible nickname. And Lilliput said, "What about Six? Because Two, Three, Four, Five and Seven won't have any trouble." (Sarcastically, obviously, I hope.) Lilliput frequently makes good points. Except that I think Five will be good, because the kids will probably call him/her "Five Alive" and often high five him/her, which will lead to a positive sense of self. Also, Three might be magic.