A Lesson from the Back Yard.

As 11 year olds go, I was a reasonable cricketer.

A few summers of front and back yard cricket with and against my Dad, older brothers and neighbourhood mates and their siblings had honed me into a decent all rounder who could routinely bowl my brother and his mates out. No quarter was given nor sought. Any flaws in style or technique were quickly and bluntly pointed out and humiliated into self-correction.

It was with this quiet confidence that I found myself bowling to my best friend from school in his back yard while his dad kept wicket behind an upturned bin and his younger brother stood at first slip.

I sent one down without a warm up, and while my action felt a little weird, the tennis ball turned on the uneven grass and my friend swung his bat and missed. His dad gasped. ‘Wow! Did you see that! What a ripper! Did you see how he disguised it out the back of his hand, boys!’ My friend scowled and tapped the ground, ready to make amends with my next ball. ‘Disguised?’ I had no idea what my friend’s dad meant. However, I registered that my ball had been effective, felt affirmed and buoyed by my friend’s dad’s enthusiastic response, and decided to try and replicate it.

I bowled and my friend again missed, and his dad was even more rapturous. ‘Gee whiz! Another beauty! Boys! Did you see that?! Fantastic!’ My friend and his bother exchanged glances, and I sensed they were annoyed that their dad was using my bowling action as a style for them to emulate. So I bowled again, trying even harder to reproduce the action of the two previous balls. Another swing and a miss, and more compliments and applause from behind the wickets. ‘What a googly!’ their dad shouted. ‘Unbelievable! I don’t think that was playable! So good!’

I was feeling a mixture of quiet pride, with sympathy for the two boys that they could not match my brilliant medium pacer skills. I was straining to restrain my smile and keep my face in the intense scowl that I thought all serious cricketers maintained. And then my friend’s younger brother said it - in a loud whisper that children use when they’re caught between politeness and the truth.

‘Dad! What are you saying? Look at his arm! He’s not bowling! He’s chucking!’

My friend’s dad, bless him, quickly responded with claims that I was an ‘unorthodox right hand swing bowler’. But it was no good. I felt my face flush red. I realised that my instinct about my clumsy first ball was correct. I had bent my arm and thrown it. My friend’s dad, having never seen me bowl, mistook my ragged first ball for my best work and sought to encourage me with his ‘attaboy’ response. Instead, he’d affirmed my error, and so I’d repeated it - even trying harder to emphasise my illegal action - meaning I committed the cardinal cricket sin of being a chucker for almost an over.

I remember that day often. The lesson I learned from my friend’s dad’s well-meaning but unhelpful attempts to make me feel good about my lack of ability by lying to me. But for the blunt honesty of a nine-year-old, I would have continued, blissfully unaware of how badly I was bowling, how my style was illegal, how unfair it was on my friend batting, and how much I was embarrassing myself as I fell far short of my capabilities and potential. Whose needs were being met?

I mostly think about that day when I see mediocrity and even incompetence in the workplace being celebrated and rewarded.