I am one of those women who has never cared much for sports — much to the disappointment of my husband (who has known me most of my life, so he knew what he was getting into when he married me!) When a football game comes on the tube, my eyes glaze over and I walk out of the room. He, on the other hand, is one of those men who will stop dead in his tracks to watch any sport on TV. It could be Blind Goats Playing Frisbee Golf and he’d suddenly forget what he had originally walked into the room to do — he’d have to stop and watch it and constantly check the score. In fact, I was convinced the first year of our marriage that something was horribly wrong with our master bedroom TV because although it would be set on Law & Order, if I walked out of the room during a commercial break, it would always end up being on ESPN when I returned, even if my husband was also no longer in the room!
Yes, I was a non-sports-fan married to a sports fanatic. I knew that invariably this meant that our future spawn would be enrolled in sports and even before our walk down the aisle I tried to negotiate some way out of attending the future practices and games — knowing that these would be painfully boring to me. JavaDad assured me that it wouldn’t be as awful as I imagined and that if I really, really hated it, I could bring a book. Attending, however, seemed non-negotiable.
Now I’ve been told (and whether this is true or merely urban legend I do not know) that we have more soccer moms per capita in the Metro DC area than anywhere in the nation — but suffice it to say that soccer is BIG here. Almost every minivan and SUV around here sports one of those soccer ball mangets that screams “SOCCER MOM” to all of us stuck in traffic behind them.
So while it wasn’t a big surprise that JavaBoy ended up taking up soccer at the tender age of 3, what was a surprise was my reaction. I expected to sit there, counting the minutes until his classes (through the county Parks and Rec program) were over. Instead, I found myself barely able to contain myself — I became THAT mom — the loud, cheering one. Nothing negative of course — not one of those parents who has to get carted off from the sidelines or who demonstrates poor sportsmanship — in fact, I cheered for all the kids, but I found myself getting swept away. Each class I would vow that I would keep quiet and I would find myself getting carried away yet again.
After the third class, I confessed to my husband. Slightly red-faced I said, ”Uh, you know how I said I would want to read books and stuff at his practices? Well, I think I’m one of THOSE moms.” “What do you mean?” “I’m a LOUD mom.” JavaDad didn’t believe me, until he attended one of the classes himself. He wasn’t quite sure what to think — who was this strange woman sitting next to him? Certainly not the same woman who can barely stand to watch the Super Bowl.
JavaBoy progressed from classes to a “team” (at 4-years-old it’s not much of a team…) and although I once again vowed to behave, I found myself cheering loudly and shouting out directions (again, all positively!) All while sitting in my folding chair complete with canopy. Yes, I have become a NoVA soccer mom — I’m just missing my soccer magnet (anyone know where I can get one….)
How did I go from non-sports-mom to loud soccer mom? I think it has to do with that expression that having children is like having your heart walking around on the outside. JavaBoy is very much like me — he’s very goal-driven (yes, even at this age, and yes, completely on his own — no pressure from mom, it’s just his nature) and he just beams when he does something well and he gets so frustrated when something doesn’t come easily to him. So when he scores a goal, I couldn’t care less that it’s a point or has anything to do with an athletic goal, it’s the smile that it brings to my boy’s face, and the fact that he will talk excitedly about it the entire way home that means the world to me.
I’m working on trying to make sure my newfound exuberance remains within acceptable (i.e. “non-embarassing”) bounds. But for now, I’m glad to find that my husband was right all along. It really is different when it is your kid – your heart — out there on the field. No books or embroidery for me, my eyes are glued on the action.
But I’ll still flip the channel on the TV back to Law & Order.
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Ok, yes, if there are people running around a field or court, usually throwing or kicking some sort of cloth or rubberized spheroid, it’ll get my attention. And though she may find it hard to believe, I can actually walk away from a game in progress (unless the “less two minutes to go, down by three”-magnet is turned on by ESPN, and then it takes a lot of willpower, or a child asking to watch Monsters, Inc. just one more time, or a well-tuned call from javamom.)