There is more to life than basketball...

Maybe this is brought on by all my watching of the NCAA women's basketball tourney. I have watched as the West brought only ten teams to a 64-team field. Only two western schools, Oklahoma and Arizona State, persisted to play in the Sweet 16. At least Baylor washed out fairly late in the second round. Oklahoma and Arizona State both started the tournament as #3 seeds and aren't predicted to play through. But basketball, like life and women, is about heart and magic and everything REALLY is up for grabs. Maybe each Eastern #1 seed...North Carolina, Tennessee, Connecticut and Duke...will win out until the very end. Or maybe they won't. Someone has to lose for a champion to win. Perhaps Oklahoma's Courtney Paris (from California) will help us become a Cinderella, come triumphantly to the ball. No matter what happens, I was struck by how permeated with spirit and power each player is, Eastern Establishment or not. No matter if she's a substantial, dark-skinned gal from down South, a lanky and rather plain WASP from the East or a tiny, roundball wizard who, barely out of high school, is running point for the Oklahoma Sooners and just happens to be full blood Native American. These are strong, determined, sweaty, raw and beautiful women. I admire them all, carrying on the spirit that I and so many others played ball with and that I try to recreate in my daily existence even now. Today's female heroes will find it is not necessary to be beautiful but it is imperative to claim your innate feminine power.

Eyes opened this week from watching unprecedented demonstrations of female strength and character, I suddenly realized that there are many more of us around than I was aware of. I am a harried old woman with lines on my face and more mother/father obligations than I can honor. I was shopping for greens in Wal-Mart after work last week when I unexpectedly glimpsed an example of the strong, feminine spirit, in one of its many, empowering permutations. I wasn't moved to touch this woman or even talk to her. But I was conscious of how her existence corresponds to mine and perhaps delineates the very essence of who we both are, two complete strangers.

The girl was maybe 25, a template of the best of who we all were at that age. She was tall from my perspective, perhaps 5'7" or so. She wore old, stained Wrangler jeans with a rip in one knee, the frayed cuffs fitting perfectly over worn, mud-splattered Cowboy boots. I had a feeling she knew who she was as the spurs strapped to her boots clanked against the store's parquet floor. Perhaps a voyeur, I watched and felt a wash of power. This woman was unabashedly strong and capable and wore her life on her back for all to see. She was no drugstore Cowboy.

She wore an altered blue tee-shirt, the holes where sleeves should be reaching down to her trim waist. Muscled arms bare, underneath the shirt was a tight blue sports bra, easy for anyone to see. She was a substantial woman, maybe 160 pounds or so, but light on her feet and well formed. A pair of steeple-pullers was at home in the back pocket of her jeans. Her white-girl face was smudged with mud and reddish at the cheekbones, pinked by the sun that had bronzed her arms. She had a shock of dark-dark hair that was mess of rakish curls tucked through the back of a Co-Op ball cap. This in a world where only my little daughter doesn't have falling-straight hair.

Carrying a lone and trivial Wal-Mart item to the speedy checkout, the woman turned to me, as strangers glimpse one another in a crowded place. Our eyes met for the space of a second. Hers were light blue and wide, infinite, like the Oklahoma sky. I recognized a sister, perhaps by birth only, and then she was gone.

I will never know this girl's name or her occupation. She is not a player in any sport I follow but I suspect she is a hero, nonetheless. I can imagine her astride a quarter horse in the blazing Oklahoma sun, gently guiding mama cows from one green wheat pasture to the next. I can see her building fence like I do, methodically and with a mind to sturdiness. I bet if called, she would drape a lost and tiny calf over her saddle horn to ride miles to find his mama. No doubt the girl can drive a rattle-trap truck, a tractor, a forklift and a dozer with equal ease. My sense is she appreciates the value of a red sunrise. Powerful.

I will never know. But I know there is more to life than basketball.