The Coldest Soccer Game in History 5.22.10

Seriously. It was SO cold. And it was the END OF MAY. This spring has been so wacked. The girls hung out in the IKEA tent we had thrown in the van. David and I tried to get warm under a sleeping bag. Ben ran around with a red nose. We wondered why we'd all driven to North Ogden to suffer.


Then we decided that we drove to North Ogden to support cute Josh in his last game of the season, and we should just deal with the cold. Josh scored the one goal for his team, and I'm glad we were there to see it.

After a while, we took turns watching from the van, which helped our spirits enormously. I won't miss driving to North Odgen, and I won't miss turning to ice on the sidelines, but I will miss watching Josh on the field.

Soccer Again 5.17.10

David came home. Hooray! And Josh had a soccer game. I packed a picnic dinner and off we went.

It's been a frustrating soccer season. The team has struggled. We talk a lot about how great it is to learn the lessons of being on a losing team. Josh has learned to be a good sport, to enjoy the game, not the results of the game, and to try to give off a positive vibe when everyone else seems to be feeling very negative.

It would have been nice to win every once in a while, too, though. Winning feels good. Losing teaches good life lessons, but it kind of sucks.

Soccer 5.3.10

Soccer season for Josh has started again in earnest, usually four days a week. Games range from Bountiful to North Ogden. I enjoy being outside, letting the littles run free and enjoying the spring weather, even if I don't love driving farther than Bountiful. Also, regarding weather: Utah, I'd sure appreciate it if you could decide whether it is spring or winter. Thanks.

Josh LOVES the game. His team is less than stellar this year, and he sometimes comes home frustrated, but he still loves to play. I also think he's learning some good life lessons from this experience. The other day he came home from a game with David. When I asked how they did, he said, "Really good! We only lost by five this time!" And he meant it. Good kid. He got up at 6:00 this morning to run death squares (a jogging/sprinting exercise) in our backyard, since he's realizing that his endurance is not where he'd like it to be. His goal is to run early 3 days this week. I'm excited to see him make some personal goals and show this kind of initiative.

Oh, also, Josh has been telling me his shorts are too short. Ummmm...I guess there is now photographic proof. Poor kid. His mom had better show some initiative, too. The sports store shopping kind.

Oops...

So I posted all about how cool my boy was for making the Davis County comp team after I got an email from the coach welcoming him to the team. Assuming he made the team seemed like a safe assumption after that, right?

Except after I blogged about it and made an enormous deal about it when he got home from school and he was beaming and feeling super cool, I got another email from the coach that pretty much said, "Oh, and by the way, it's not the PREMIER team we're talking about, it's the second team. Sorry for any misunderstanding."

So I had to tell my boy, who was rightfully disappointed, and take down my post, which was a little embarrassing.

What's that proverb? Don't count your chickens before they're hatched?

Yeah.

But still, Josh, congrats on the five goals you made in the scrimmage last night, my wonderful boy. Won't it be nice to finally know which team you'll actually play on? Living in Limbo Land is getting a little old.

Big Fish in a Little Pond

So the morning after the disappointment of the comp tryouts, Josh scored three goals in his last game of the season. Maybe this big fish/little pond stuff isn't so bad...

(Isn't he cute? I dig the kid.)

(Should I be calling him cute anymore? He's almost thirteen...when do I have to stop calling him cute?)

(But he is cute.)

Bubble Wrapping Not Available

Let's face it, parenting has its moments of both sheer joy and utter despair. Tonight may not fall in the range of despair, but a lot of it has been just plain yucky.

Here's the backstory. Josh loves soccer. He played rec soccer for a few years with a wonderful team and a couple of great coaches. He wasn't a star on his team, but he played with a lot of heart. Two years ago, he made the second tier competition team for our club, and he loved it. LOVED it. The boys and parents were great, as was his coach. He learned so much, grew leaps and bounds as a player, and did I mention he LOVED it? By the end of the year, though, I could see that his skills were not quite matching those of the strongest players. He wasn't quite as aggressive as them, didn't have quite the skill level that they did. He was on the bench more and more frequently, and I just got a pit in my stomach when I thought about tryouts in May. I encouraged (kindly and supportively) Josh to practice frequently, to go on training runs, and to work hard to move forward in his ability, but when the second night of tryouts came around, it was totally obvious that Josh was being cut from his team.

That was a yucky night.

He handled his disappointment with grace. I kept a stiff upper lip, but I was devastated for him. He tried to shrug it off, and he felt like it was the right thing at that time, but it still stung, and we both knew it.

He decided to play with some other friends on a rec team this year. He's been able to really shine as a striker, has made lots of goals, and enjoyed seeing his buddies. But he wasn't really being trained, and his skills weren't really improving. He has just had a good time. (Really, in the long run, isn't that what sports are for?) It's been a very pleasant year for all of us. It's been cheaper, less stress, less travel, less car-pooling, and less time-commitment. All in all, it was a good year.

But he wanted to get back on his team.

So tonight was the last night of tryouts. He was scrappy, more aggressive than he had been last year. I had high hopes for him. And then they called numbers for the final scrimmage and it was clear who would be in the two comp teams.

Not my sweet boy.

Sometimes I want to bubble wrap my kids, to keep them safe from pain. I want to protect their bodies from being hurt, their hearts from being broken, their spirits from being crushed. But I can't. And I know it's not healthy to keep them from heartache and disappointment. Being disappointed is part of living. Pain is part of living. Without it, we never really grow. We never really improve or become better people.

I know that. And I know that it is better for my kids to learn to handle disappointment when I can still be there to help pick up the pieces, to model a good attitude, to take them out for ice cream and let them have a double scoop.

But it still stinks. And I still wish things were different.

Joshua vs Goliath