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Blog Entry 5 of 47 What's happening in YOUR neighborhood?

Hi everyone, I'm the YourHub.com editor for the Ventura County Star. I'm glad you found your way to the blog section. If you're not familiar with them, "blog" is simply short for "Web log" and you can think of it as an online journal where you can wax philosophic on subjects large or small, international or personal. Just remember if you choose to add the blog to the YourHub listings, anyone can read what you write. My blog tends to be about random thoughts and observations that hopefully will spur conversation either on local topics or local effects of wider-reaching topics. Please feel free to leave comments with your own views -- or better yet, start your own blog and write about it!

Blog Url: http://vc.yourhub.com/~BeccaBlog

Post your summer activities

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Contributed by: Becca Whitnall on 6/11/2007

I tried my hand at being one of the boys of summer once. It wasn't just that I'm female that made me a failure; I just wasn't very good. I had begged my parents to sign me up for t-ball because my best friend was going to play. She opted out at the last minute in a move I would have been wise to emulate.

Instead, I soldiered through it, at various points finding myself using a wrong-handed glove, hit by pitches (half the season was pitch-ball), watching the bees out in left field and once being nose to nose with the ump in a batting stance. This was years ago when there was a Statham Little League, located out in Oxnard, where a hotel and IHOP now stand, but somehow I still get teased for it. And I still claim it wasn't really my fault.

A left hander, I confidently approached the right side of home and took my stance. The umpire, figuring I was a mixed up five-year-old gently told me I was on the wrong side of the plate. I knew he wasn't correct so I stood there a moment, confused, before he told me I had to turn around, meaning I should bat from the other side of the plate. All I heard was "turn around" and, still confused, did as instructed. I altered my stance and brought my bat back up near my shoulder, this time facing him. I might not have been a good ball player, but I sure could follow directions, even if they didn't make sense to me. As I said, I would have been smart to forego my ball playing career but my parents wouldn't allow it. They wanted me to learn a lesson about not quitting. What I learned was to hate playing organized youth baseball -almost a capital crime in my family, where my brother played all through school, my sister's spent a few years as president of my nephew's local league and my father is still a district manager even though he hasn't had a kid playing in more than 15 years. I guess every family has its black sheep.

I fared better with swimming, competing on a year-round team from third grade into high school. I was never great but had fun and stayed active, which was also important in my family.

In the summers we'd look through the local parks and recreation departments' catalogs to see what fun activities they were offering. We'd pursue everything from tap dance and ballet to art classes. But if it hadn't been for an announcement in the local paper, I wouldn't have known when to sign up for my favorite summer program as a kid, junior lifeguards, where my friends and I ran and swam on the beach, learned about ocean safety, performed mock rescues and got to travel for competitions.

Knowing what summer fun is to be had in the county, I'd like to extend an invitation to organizations hosting activities to post on YourHub.com.

Whether your church runs a youth summer camp, your political organization is planning a symposium or, yes, even if your traveling youth baseball team is recruiting players, you have a virtually unlimited bulletin board with a very local audience with which to share your message.

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