So, this is what resilience looks like. Nice.

DD8 has been hitting soft-tossed balls with a bat for at least 5 years now... mostly indoors, with a plastic bat and those balls you'd use to fill up a ball pit the kids dive into. She's been showing real ability with it for a while now, and recently expressed a desire to sign up for softball.

So, this weekend we stopped off at the sporting goods store, picked up a regulation softball, a glove, and a bat, so she could start familiarizing herself with the right equipment. We spent an afternoon, first in the backyard, and then at the park, playing with the new equipment. Among the activities were the following mishaps:

- We played catch, and DD was making the typical beginner's mistake of catching with her hand, rather than the pocket, and this alleged "soft" ball was hurting her. She changed to tossing it to herself for a while, getting the feel for using the pocket.

- Later, at the ball field, I pitched one too high and inside. DD doesn't judge balls and strikes yet, so she opened herself up to it as she swung. The ball hit her in the chin. It hurt.

- She was hit by two other pitches later, because apparently, her dad sucks at pitching, and he should stick to other things. At least these other two didn't strike solid bone.

In years past, any one of these issues would have been the point at which she declared she hated softball, or she was awful at it, and she wanted nothing further to do with it. Also, anyone asking her about her experience would have been told that it was a terrible day, and they would have only heard about the negative moments. Instead, she talked about what a blast she'd been having, how she wanted us to do this at least once a week so she could get good at it, and how lucky she was to have parents who went out there and played with her like we did.