This video brought me so much joy. Amy is one of my daughter Polly’s best and oldest friends. I asked Polly how long its been, and she said, ‘from the start, forever.’
You can play a game of Where’s Wilsons with the above video.
They’re now in the under 18s and play soccer together for the Yarra Jets — Polly usually as striker, Amy as a defensive mid. We drive Amy to trainings and games and she has a reputation in our household as the most likely person in the universe to make herself cry, only by laughing. Amy is often excited and has a rare ability to tell an anecdote at pace, and she makes these seven minute drives feel like they take less than five. Yes, they both should be riding to training. Nothing makes Amy and Polly laugh harder than the parent group whinging that they both should be riding to training.
I love the free kick video for so many reasons. Here is a list of them
I love that I decided to film it. To be honest, I saw it going in, long before she measured her run. I’m not saying I have gifts. Actually I am saying I have gifts. I hardly ever pull out the phone for a set piece, but there was something about the way Amy lined up — throw in the the fact that Saturn is currently in retrograde, and of course I filmed it.
I love that Jack says, ‘what are you doing? What are you doing Dad?’ over the build up, because he hasn’t realised that I already know what’s going to happen. ‘Videoing what?’ he says to cue Amy’s run, and then those are the last words. Videoing what, Jack? Videoing fucking THIS!
I love Amy running with fists pumping to accept the oncoming rush of teammates, and the fact that Polly is on the subs bench to provide the cinematic close up —. it’s pure joy at this point.
I love that Sue, Amy’s mum, is there on the sidelines and she falls into a hug with another parent, Bridget, and emerges so emotional and so red faced that you can only assume Sue, unlike me, did not think Amy was an absolute certainty to slot a twenty five metre curling free kick into the top corner;
I love the fact that I zoomed the video in, and we could send it almost immediately to Amy’s dad, Ivan, who was sick on the couch with Covid and enduring another Saints loss by less than a goal, and generally in need of seeing his second born smash it into the net like she’s Caitlin Foord;
I love that when I said to Polly, ‘gee I reckon I’ve just shot a great video, but I really regret not doing it in slo-mo’ she said, ‘but we can just put it in Snapchat and use a slo-mo effect. Any video can be made slo mo, dad!. I don’t have Snapchat.
I love that the girls trailed 4-1 just before half time but then rallied to win 9-4. It was a heroic comeback, and I was happy I passed up the first quarter of Hawthorn versus West Coast to watch it.
I almost always choose kids sport over the pros. After all,. who needs sustained excellence when there’s occasional gob-smacking excellence to be had closer to home.
Not that I was surprised this time, Amy.
Jupiter is in retrograde.
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Bend it like Amy