Volleyball at the Park
When I was about 12 years old, my family moved to a new city, and we were a volleyball family. We started the whole volleyball trend with the community, Hmong and Whites. The Hmong people eventually brought their own net because they preferred to play on grass. The white guys preferred sand, but we both mixed and mingled.
When we first arrived in the neighborhood, the white guys were awful at volleyball. I wasn't even a teenager yet, but I already had years of volleyball because my family played it. One of the guys asked me to teach him how to pass because he saw how well I was passing. The Whites eventually stopped playing 6v6 and 4v4 in favor of 2v2. They actually got pretty good. Some of them eventually joined the AVP Tour. I don't think they made any money from it, but they at least tried.
The Hmong played everything from 6s, 5s, 4s, and 3s. However, we didn't play 2s. Volleyball eventually got big enough where people started making teams and entering Hmong tournaments. By the time I was old enough to play in tournaments, I had already moved out of town to attend a different school.
When I was back home, I saw that my oldest niece, 12 years old, has picked up volleyball. Unlike me, she didn't play at the park. She played at school. She really likes volleyball, and she raves about how awesome her coach is. My sister and brother in-law start laughing and ask me to ask her who her coach is. I would have never guessed it, but her coach is that white guy that I taught how to pass the ball when I was 12 years old. Go figure. Life can be funny like that.