What’s your favorite word?
When I was younger I loved ‘collecting’ words, the more unusual, the better. I enjoyed playing with their sound in my head and thinking about when and where I could use them. This was not, I am well aware, a mainstream interest (!) but it inculcated in me a lifelong love of lexical oddities. So, what word from childhood will I choose?
Eponymous, meaning something that has the same name as the title of a book, play or record is a delightful word. Complex in spelling and rarely used, it was an immediate favourite. When I found out that the adverb form was Eponymously, and that it was the root of the phrase Eponymously Titled, I had this whole scenario in my head based around a fictitious group who really should exist. The band Eponymously Titled would release their debut album, the Eponymously Titled Eponymously Titled! I suppose now, it could equally apply to a podcast! It made me laugh then and still makes me grin now.
What are you doing this evening?
I used to go to the cinema a lot. As a teenager I went with my friends, when Janet and I were dating we saw loads of films together, and when the children were younger we took them to a whole range of family films. Somewhere along the line, though, the cinema became too expensive, the behaviour of the other cinema goers became too irritating and it was all but removed from my thoughts. Getting the Dvd or Blu Ray was cheaper and much less hassle. In the last 15 years I have seen perhaps 10 films on the big screen. Cinema trips have been almost entirely replaced by theatre trips which I think have an immediacy and an atmosphere that completely outdoes the big screen. So, what has possessed me to have a cinema trip tonight?
Tonight, my two daughters and I are heading to the cinema at Bluewater Shopping Centre to watch Freakier Friday. I took my oldest daughter and her brothers to the original film, Freaky Friday, in Australia and absolutely loved it, perhaps more than they did! It was the time when Lindsay Lohan couldn’t put a foot wrong. She was without doubt one of the most talented young actresses we have seen. The centre of the film for me was Jamie Lee Curtis, who is one of those actors who could read the phone book and make it funny! I am going to watch the original film today just to get into the story afresh and I can’t wait to see it.
It’s always great going somewhere with my children. I am fully aware that I am very fortunate that they still want to share films, plays and concerts with me. Clearly it is a measure of family closeness but I think it’s also that I have taken a lot of interest in their favourite films and artists. In many ways their music and their film and TV programmes have kept me young in my mind, but I am also a big kid at heart which definitely helps! So, a meal out and a film is a very rare treat for me so I am looking forward to this evening very much indeed. I may even review the film tomorrow so watch this space!
Describe your ideal week.
The problem with an ‘ideal’ week is that you are very unlikely to know it is happening. You have to be entirely present in everything for seven days in order to achieve that level of ideal. I think you can have ideal days and, at a stretch, an ideal weekend, but an ideal week is out of the scope of most of us.
Even if you could have things come together, you are not likely to be able to see the ideal nature of a period of time until afterwards. Then, are you judging it properly? Are you looking back through rose coloured glasses? So many questions, so much over thinking! I guess that’s the problem isn’t it? You need a level of simplicity and level headedness that most of us don’t share. With all of the caveats above, the weekend just gone was pretty much ideal. We went to the Emirates Stadium on Saturday to watch Arsenal Women win 4-1, then took the train down to Eastbourne and had a very pleasant late afternoon and evening there. The following day we started with a lovely walk along the beach, explored the town and then went to Eastbourne Town Ladies ground to watch my daughter’s team win 6-2 in the First Qualifying Round of the Women’s F A Cup. Today we are back home and my wife and I are celebrating our 35th wedding anniversary – Coral apparently – with a quietish day.
So, there you have it. Sometimes you can get close to ideal if you don’t plan, don’t have preconceived assumptions and just take life as it comes. Trying to plan for an ideal week cannot work in my opinion.
Name the professional athletes you respect the most and why.
For the last 15 years I have seen first hand the growth of women’s football at both the grassroots and then the professional level. It has been a long journey, but what an amazing amount of progress the sport has made in that time.
My daughter started playing football as a nine year old in 2010. By the time she had finished playing for her team seven years later she was the only original member of that team left and she played 150 games without missing a single one through injury or illness. At the end of the first season the team reached the cup final for the Under 10 girls and I wrote a report to go into the local paper. For the rest of the time the team played together, another seven seasons, I wrote a report for every single one of their games. When I missed the odd game I got the details from the players and parents and then used my knowledge of the players to write a report that would fit in with the rest of those I wrote first hand. At the end of each season I put the reports together as a file and sent it through to the club chairman who printed them out. The girls were presented with the reports at the end of the season and, I was always pleased to note, immediately looked for their names, statistics and, for the last four seasons the short paragraphs I wrote about their playing style, their contributions to the team and their standout moments of the year. It was a labour of love and I enjoyed every minute of it.
I also tried to mark special occasions with something that money couldn’t buy. For my daughter’s 100th match I organised a card from the Lionesses which contained messages from all the players and for her 150th match, a congratulations card from Sir Alex Ferguson the manager of Manchester United, her favourite team. In the last couple of seasons we had a striker who was so good that she scored two goals a game and obliterated all our previous scoring records. She was a huge Chelsea fan so I got her a card from the Chelsea Women’s Team at the time. I was emotionally invested in the team to an incredible extent and I regard it as an absolute privilege to have given something back to the them. Actually, one of my previous posts reflected on my organising of Boxing Day matches to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Christmas Truce and the football matches in No Man’s Land. https://davidgpearce205.wordpress.com/2022/12/22/the-christmas-truce-1914/
I suppose that has given me a huge amount of interest in the rise of Women’s Football at the professional level especially over the last four years. I am a regular visitor to the Emirates Stadium to watch Arsenal Women and it has given me a love of football that the Men’s game never engendered. The atmosphere of enthusiasm and the shared love of the game comes without the aggressive tribalism and nastiness of Men’s Football. The mainly female, mainly young and wholly inclusive crowd is always totally safe and utterly enjoyable. I am always so pleased to see young girls with their replica shirts on and I have noticed that in the past three seasons, the previous split of about 75/25 in terms of names on those shirts of men’s team players to women’s team players has completely reversed. Even I go along proudly wearing the name of my favourite player on my back!
Alessia Russo is not only one of the hardest working forwards I have ever seen, but she displays none of the petulance of her male counterparts and plays the game with the same joy I saw with my daughter and her team mates. The other players, who I also love watching never lose sight of how lucky they are to earn their living at the sport they love. They are always wholly appreciative of the fans and play the game without the tiresome play acting that has scarred the men’s game. I have lost interest in the Premier League and the rest of the male game. For me, football is now all about the young women who play with smiles on their faces and a realisation that they are the role models for a sport that is on the up with our amazing Lionesses leading the way at international level, Chelsea dominating at domestic level with amazing players like Sandy Baltimore and Erin Cuthbert, and of course our Champions League winners, the Arsenal team with players like Leah Williamson, Katie McCabe and Mariona Caldentey showing skills that take the breath away at times.
It’s the Women’s F A Cup First Qualifying Round today and I am in Eastbourne. Why? My daughter, who has carried on playing, joined a new team that was being set up two years ago by Hollands and Blair. They have been promoted twice in those two seasons, got to a Cup Final, beating a number of higher ranked teams and today they face Eastbourne Town in the F A Cup. It’s been an incredible two seasons for them and this is just another huge step for a young team who have been inspired by the trailblazers of the Women’s game over the last decade and a half. Win, lose or draw (although I am not sure if I can go through a penalty shootout!!) the Hollands and Blair Ladies can be incredibly proud of themselves as they write a new chapter in their own story.
UPDATE!! Eastbourne Town Ladies 2 Hollands and Blair Ladies 6 (SIX) Through to the 2nd Qualifying Round! What a proud Dad moment!
David Pearce - Popular Culture and Personal Passions 