The other day I was walking through a soccer field to get to the rec cen pool (UCSB students will know what I mean). Anyway, as I'm walking, this group of half a dozen young women like fifty yards away from me suddenly kick a ball in my direction, but like, as a mistake, like when someone kicks the ball over the fence that you're on the other side on and then says "hey, ball! Ball!". You know the deal. Except there was no fence between us here.

Anyway, so these girls were about fifty yards from me, and I swear to you, the ball only traveled twenty-five yards in my direction. Now I'm no geometrician but it appeared that the ball was as close to them as it was to me. So I'm thinking, hold on, what? Why are they "ball!"-ing me? Why is this my responsibility? The ball is not even moving anymore. It's stationary at the midpoint between us.

So I slow down a little and squint towards them to try to get a closer look at this; my vision is good but not perfect, so maybe my depth perception was off, after all I'm only human. But no. Midpoint.

By this point they're getting sort of frustrated with me. "Hey, ball!". I see them looking at me, and they see me looking at them, for a solid few seconds. "Baaalllll!". And I'm just not having it. Sorry ladies but you're the soccer players and I'm just a guy about to go for a swim, maybe have some fun on the diving board. I'm not opposed to returning a ball, but it's clearly in their court, so to speak. I've got places to go, laps to swim.

So I keep walking. And as I turn away, I hear an audible groan, as in like "uuuugh, why didn't he help us?". As if I'm the jerk. As if I kicked the ball in the first place and then misjudged the distance it traveled. There's just no way to make an experience like that enjoyable.