My daughter had her school athletics carnival this week. This is a day that she looks forward to all year as she excels in athletics. This year, however, she had a bit of a challenging day. At one point through the carnival she was in tears telling me how she didn’t want to disappoint anyone. It has led me to contemplate the difference between being feeling excited, and feeling proud, and I am writing about it now to get my thoughts in order so that I can explain to her why, no matter what the result, I am the opposite of disappointed. Let me preface this with a note that she is exhausted at the moment, physically and mentally. She is in a production of Oliver at the local theatre, and the rehearsals have proven to be longer, more frequent, and more tiring than we imagined. Excited is how I felt when she won her 100m race. Proud is how I felt when she kept going, even though she missed the start whistle and started a couple of seconds after the other girls. I
The life and times of the Woolleys