Kid Amnesiac

Holding his consolationist trophy after 3 1/2 hours of non-stop match play

I learned something about Simon’s anxiety this weekend. It’s better—better than it used to be and better than my own (which is also better than it used to be).

The whole story began Sunday night nine days ago, when my phone rang at about 9:00 p.m. It was one of Simon’s tennis coaches calling to suggest that we sign him up for a novice, 10 and under boys singles tournament the following Saturday. The catch was that we had to register by an 11:59 deadline.

My immediate thought was “why not?”, followed by “this will be fun!”, followed by completing the paperwork, followed by having massive anxiety. Was Simon ready for this? Shouldn’t he have have completed one intermediate clinic and/or match play clinic before a competition? He just got promoted from advance beginner 9 & 10 to intermediate 9 & 10, but this seemed a bit premature. What if all the other kids were 10 and future Nadals? What if Simon got humiliated on the court? What if the whole thing was traumatic and turned him off the sport or put him in therapy?

It wasn’t pretty. We signed him up for a Thursday private lesson to get ready, review the scoring, work on his serve, and alleviate my anxiety. Saturday at 2:00 it was game time.

My stomach felt wobbly.

Tennis tournaments are nothing like soccer tournaments. The kids are responsible for making their own line calls, for starters, with a ref coming over only to watch a few points if a kid calls him or her over after too many perceived bad calls. The parents aren’t guaranteed a decent view, either. If your kid is playing on a back court, you can’t see much. Finally, what with it being an individual sport, your kid has no one else to lean on, blame, or take comfort from. It’s all on their narrow shoulders.

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Another year of school wraps up today, and it was, in a word, perfect.

I don’t toss that word around lightly, but it’s hard to find a better way to characterize 2013-2014. This was the year in which Simon never missed a day from illness, didn’t have any weepy days brought on by his own imperfections or the misbehavior of others, and skipped his annual mid-winter emotional slump.

On the friendship side, he did well in terms of quantity and quality. His class was loaded with the type of nice, sensitive, well behaved, and smart boys he gravitates towards. But that’s only half the story. He also got to know and befriend a bevvy of smart, nice, and well behaved girls. He loved nearly everyone in his class, and so did I.

I attribute some of this year’s wonderfulness to luck. Some goes to time and maturity. But the lion’s share is owing to his talented and resourceful teacher. Mrs. Thomas was new to Brandeis this year, and when I first saw the teacher assignment I groaned “ugh, the new teacher.” What I didn’t know then is that this “new teacher” was soon to be nationally accredited and had taught herself a workshop-focused method of instruction. For a (formerly) timid and perfectionist kid like Simon, working in small groups was just what he needed to overcome his hesitation to participate. In a year, Simon went from being the kid who didn’t raise his hand to being the one who had his hand up most of the time.

What makes this year of growth and happiness all the more surprising is that Matt and I asked a lot—too much in hindsight—from him. First grade is year when many kids struggle to work independently in the classroom. So what did we do to help him prepare for new expectations? We had him continue drum lessons and play soccer and tennis with a pack of third and fourth graders. Worse still, he got stuck on one losing team and another that didn’t start to win until half-way through the season.

Just a few days ago, a friend of mine was recounting Simon’s recent activities:

“Geez, Jessica. Extra soccer practices, drum lessons, tennis tournaments* against 9- and 10-year-olds, advanced math. He’s only 7! Pull back on the throttle a little.”

She’s right. Except it’s hard to know when and where to pull back when Simon handled everything we threw at him with grace and equanimity. We saw very little stress. The math is self-directed, the soccer and tennis are passions, and he seemed to love socializing with the older boys. In fact, if it weren’t for friends like Katie, Apurv, Jacob, Rhyse, and Tanay, I think he’d self deport to third grade if they’d let him. (Katie is the Caroline of the group: super smart, sweet, and laid back. Simon was as excited to watch her win the best reader award at awards day yesterday as he would have been to win himself. Apurv and Jacob are pictured above.)

Third grade will have to wait, though. Next up is second, which, if it is half as good as this year, will be a resounding success.

*Simon plays in his first USTA Futures 10 and under tournament tomorrow. We entered on a lark at a pro’s suggestion and are excited and nervous to see how it plays out.

Over the past year I’ve worked hard to find the right reading material for Simon. He’s a fine reader—a very good one in fact—but reading is not something Simon gravitates to for recreation, and he prefers my reading to him over his reading to himself.

All of which is fine. Simon’s true loves are obviously sports and math. I haven’t written about the math love lately, but it has continued as passionately as ever. These days he satisfies math cravings by learning his multiplication tables, playing with factorials and powers, and figuring out how much the winning contestant on Jeopardy should bet in Final Jeopardy. He does all of this in his head, oftentimes faster than I can. It’s amazing and delightful, and Matt and I both look forward to his actuary career supporting our retirement.

But I digress. This year I really wanted Simon to enjoy reading more. The key to this, as every article and educator will tell you, is to find the right book for your child. By “right”, they mean right subject, right tone, and right reading level. We did well with story collections, but struggled when looking for chapter books.

We found books that were too hard for him, books that were too easy for him, and books that were too snarky for both of us. I do not need a book to teach Simon how to sound like a snotty teenager; I’m sure he’ll figure that out on his own when the time comes. We finally landed on a Beverly Cleary book that hit the reading sweet spot.

From that point on, I’ve mostly been bringing home old books or books written in an older style. The hallmark of these stories is that they are not too scary, the kids in them aren’t all sour and jaded, and the parents are not depicted as buffoons. If you’re not careful, reading enough of these will lead you down a path of nostalgia for the “good old days” when times were simpler and well behaved children showed some respect for their parents.

I generally distrust any allusion to “good old days”. It comes naturally: My Zadie, born in 1911, responded to any reference to good old days with a hurumph and the question “good for what?” He believed in progress, whether it come in the form of returnable space craft, vaccines, or civil rights, and I share his viewpoint. Yet there I was, reading books that made me long for a bygone era of confident and competent parents, respectful and innocent children, and strong communal ties.

Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing and The Hardy Boys cured me of this temporary insanity. Matt and I chose Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing because we thought the character Fudge was hilarious. The book is set in New York City in the early 70s. We both remembered the 3-year-old boy Fudge and what a mess he was. We both forgot that New York City was a cesspool in the 70s and 80s. I had to stop reading at one point to explain to Simon what “mugging” meant as the title character explained how his dad told him to behave if/when he got mugged.

That was the second most awful thing in the book. The top prize went to a reference to the countryside upstate, where the miracle of leaves changing color in fall takes place. According to our narrator, leaves in 1970s New York City did not change colors because of air pollution.

So much for longing for the good old days of my childhood.

As for The Hardy Boys, I never made it past the dust jacket. The book I brought home was an original written in the 1920s, a relic from the time my grandparents were children. The editor of that volume carefully explained that modern readers might be taken aback by the descriptions of gender and racial inequalities revealed in the text and be offended by some of the language. I’m not sure what “language” I’d have to explain to Simon, but I’m absolutely sure I have no desire to teach that particular lesson.

Nostalgia sufficiently cured, I will return to Beverly Cleary and hope to find more books like hers that cherry pick the best bits of a bygone era while eliding the urban decay and social injustice.

Yesterday Simon played in two soccer games. His team won the first game 2-0 and lost the second 0-10. Can you guess which performance I was the proudest of?

If you guessed the epic beat-down, you are correct. Here’s what happened: Simon’s full roster showed up for the first game, played hard, and pulled off a solid victory over a well matched team from southern Indiana. The boys were so excited and proud!

Ten minutes later, a second LSA (Louisville Soccer Alliance, Simon’s club) team was due to play a team from Mockingbird Sports Complex (the outdoor, competitive version of where Simon plays indoors). With only five minutes to go before the game was set to begin, a group of us realized that Coach Duke was sitting on the sidelines with just 2 other boys. Where was our team? We needed four more to field a team and more than that to have any hope of substitutions.

And so, 4 out of 6 families still on the field patted their sons on the back, handed them back their water, and sent them over to play their second game of the morning with no rest and no lunch in between (it was noon by now). They were all running on empty, but it was the right thing to do for the club and the league.

So of course the Mockingbird team had to be their oldest, fastest, and best crew. All but one of their kids looked to be nine already; we fielded two 7-year-olds playing up. Their kids were fresh; our kids had heavy legs. Their team was one that frequently plays up in the U-10 division; we had a tired, second-string group out there.

Basically, they were older than us, taller than us, faster than us, and better than us. Even their uniforms were sharper. It was like watching a college team play against Real Madrid. They scored three times in the opening 5 minutes before their coach put restrictions on the players to keep the score at 10-0 instead of, say, 50-0. It was one for the history books.

We parents were all overjoyed when the final whistle blew. The boys from the first game were exhausted, walking slowly on heavy legs and red faced from heat and exhaustion. Simon was near tears and limping slightly. What a way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

But the other way to look at this, and the thing we all told the boys, was that regardless of the scoreline, they should be proud of themselves for doing the right thing and giving it their all. There’s no shame in losing to a better team, especially when you already played (and won!) your scheduled game. Coach Duke told the boys to keep their heads up, have fun, and play the game they love the best they could. The LSA parents talked about how we were all proud of them for making sure our club didn’t forfeit a game and for not having the Mockingbird team show up for naught. To their immense credit, the Mockingbird coach and parents put restrictions on the boys and offered only the most muted of goal celebrations.

I think we all demonstrated good sportsmanship. And at least half of us took our kids out for ice cream—and whatever else they wanted—after the beat-down. The only negative feelings I’m left with are those for the parents who blew off a game without alerting the coach.

Pigs have taken wing. Hell has frozen over. Simon has just declared that he is ready to take a little break from soccer.

All it took was nine months of continuous play, barring a few weeks off in November between indoor and outdoor sessions, two weeks at the holidays, a snow day, and two rained out practices. Other than that, from September 2013 to the present, Simon has played soccer a minimum of three times per week. From March to the present, he’s played or practiced four times per week. During a two-week overlap of indoor and outdoor sessions, Simon played five times per week.

This week was the most intense yet, with a game on Saturday, a tennis clinic on Sunday, practice Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday, and a make-up game on Tuesday. That’s a lot of running for a little guy, and he’s doing it on a full field with boys 1-2 years older than he is.

Yesterday, for the first time in ages, Simon fell asleep in the car on the way home from school. Once inside the house, he told me he was “a little soccered out” and ready for a break. I didn’t know if I’d ever hear this from him, but it made sense. Everyone has their limits, and Simon has pushed himself to extremes.

Of course, he went on to work hard at practice for 1.5 hours and stayed an extra half hour to play with a friend and try to score on Coach Duke.

So do I believe him? Sort of. I believe he’s overdone it the last week. I believe that after nine straight months his body—like anyone’s—is ready for an off-season. (Even the pros take mid-May through mid-August off.) I believe he’s ready for some time in the pool, some time on the golf course with his grandfather, and a lot of time on the tennis court.

But I also believe that two weeks into his off season he’ll be kicking the ball around the house non-stop and begging to go to Seneca Park to play. I’m not sure if Simon is capable of taking an extended break from soccer no matter how much his body could benefit from it. Having said that, I’m heartened that he’s run up against perceived limits and wants to try to ease off.

His focus, dedication, and seemingly endless capacity for exertion was inhuman! A little slack will do us all good.

I don’t know how the kids are doing spring fever wise, but I know at least one grown-up who is over this year. That would be me.

It’s not that the year hasn’t been a good one. It has! It’s just that at this point in the game, things are taking on a valedictory tone and I am ready to kick back and relax. I know that Simon’s reading has progressed nicely, his math is terrific as usual, and he is growing more confident and independent all the time. He is more than ready for second grade, and I’m feeling like my work here is done.

As a result of this feeling, I am happy to send Simon off to school every day, but I’m not so keen on activities that require parental supervision. Enter the most recent first-grade project. Every month, the first grade team has assigned an extra project for the kids to work on. There was a nature project, a doubles (math) project, a decorated Turkey project,  a Flat Stanley project, and a President’s Day project. All of these involve some degree of parental support, and most of them call on the exact skill set—cutting, pasting, arranging, drawing—where Simon needs the most help. He is not a crafty or artistic child at all.

Last Monday, Simon came home with a piece of paper that gave me the vapors: It was time for a shapes project. Each student was to go on a shape walk, look for the shapes they’ve been studying in class, and present to the class. It was due in a week, which is a much shorter deadline than usual. Meanwhile, Monday it rained, Tuesday Simon went home with my mom, Wednesday was soccer, Thursday was soccer, Friday was Oaks day and soccer, Saturday was Derby Day, drumming, and a play-date, and Sunday was his best friend’s birthday party. And oh yeah, my dad is still in the rehab center recovering from his knee replacement surgery.

Mama had NO interest in getting out the construction paper, poster-board, and all that jazz again. In fact, mama was feeling pretty bitter about the entire endeavor and actively encouraged procrastination. Then mama read the fine print: “students can make a poster, a book, or even a multi-media presentation.”

Technology to the rescue! It may not be what Simon would most benefit from, but doing the whole shebang digitally was certainly going to make my life easier, and I was all about the easy. The two of us went to the park, Simon found and posed with shapes he liked, I took all the pictures with my digital camera, and then we came home and loaded the suckers into a PowerPoint slide deck for which Simon provided captions.

Easy peasy. No glue, markers, stickers, or tears were involved in this project. When we finished, I sent the whole thing to the teacher as an email attachment, which was also a heck of a lot easier than driving Simon across town to deliver a giant poster.

This wasn’t what Simon needed to do to develop the most, and some of the technology we used, specifically the PowerPoint, was over his head and not age appropriate. Having said that, it was a snap for me and I have no regrets. We’ll get back to fine motor skills and visual presentations next August. Is it summer yet?

As I’ve mentioned a few (hundred) times, we’re a bit over-booked at present. As a result, there’s not a lot of free time in our household. Most days feel like a sprint. Pick up Simon from school, race home, race to get dinner or half dinner down his gullet, race to soccer, race to finish homework, race to review weekly vocabulary words, race to squeeze in a drum practice, race to do nightly reading, race to get in pajamas, get teeth brushed, and get into bed by 8:45.

Wake up. Repeat next day, and the one after that, and the one after that.

This past weekend was turbo-charged as well. Simon got to participate in the Derby Cup, a two-day soccer tournament in neighboring Oldham County. The weather was terrific, the soccer fields in Buckner were beautiful, and the boys played hard in all three of their games. It was a great weekend, but with three round-trip drives of 40 miles each, a regular drum practice, and a visit to my dad who is recovering from knee replacement surgery, our weekend was even more compressed than normal.

Monday, the whole cycle should have started once more. Except storms were in area, our Coach was no doubt exhausted from supervising a total of 12 games (4 Louisville Soccer Alliance teams had 3 games each), and the boys themselves needed a rest after playing 150 minutes of fast-paced soccer in two days. So Coach Brett canceled Monday night’s practice.

This is a short week at school, too, as Kentucky suspends education on the Friday before Derby to allow teachers to attend the Oaks and/or start pre-gaming* their Derby parties. Short weeks mean no vocabulary lists to work on. And because Simon had a sub on Monday, we didn’t have other homework assigned, either.

In other words, from 4:20, when we got home from school, until 8:30, when it was bedtime, we had complete freedom. And none of us knew what to do with it! Simon ran around in circles. I read Mad Men reviews on the web. (Don should NOT have taken that offer!) We ate dinner. We played a ton of Uno. We watched videos of amazing soccer goals. And after what seemed like an endless evening, we checked the time and were horrified to see it was only 7:30.

That’s right; our family was left confused and generally unmoored by four hours of horrible, horrible freedom.

The school year and soccer season both end five weeks hence. What on earth are we going to do with ourselves?

*pre-game: vb. To drink at home or a friend’s home in advance of going out to drink at a party elsewhere. I learned this word from a book about sorority life and now use it whenever possible.

Skip: You guys. You lollygag the ball around the infield. You lollygag your way down to first. You lollygag in and out of the dugout. You know what that makes you? Larry!

Larry: Lollygaggers!

Skip: Lollygaggers. (Bull Durham)

Having now spent two years listening to parents encourage, admonish, and coach their kids from the sidelines, I’ve developed some pretty strong feelings about the role of parents in youth sports. Specifically, I think it’s important for parents to let the coaches do the coaching and limit their role to support.

There are a few reasons for this. First, I—the person sitting next to you—do not need to have someone yelling in my ear for 40 minutes of play. Secondly, the children need to be listening to their coaches and figuring things out for themselves. Thirdly, oftentimes what the parents are spewing out is either pointless—“kick the ball!”—or flat-out wrong—“boot it!”

You know how often I’ve heard a coach tell a kid to “boot it!”? Never.

On the other hand, there is something I wish parents would do more of, and that’s match their kids to the right sport. It seems these days that the vast majority of middle-class Americans sign their kids up for soccer at some point. Soccer has almost become the default team sport for parents nervous about head injuries.

This isn’t doing the kids any favors. For example, soccer is not a great place for the autistic child, as it relies so heavily on non-verbal communication and spacing. Still, I can understand how or why the parent of an autistic child would sign their kid up in a rec league and not understand all the hurdles involved.

But that’s an example of a situation complicated by a clinical diagnosis, and I came here to rant about something much simpler: Parents, don’t sign your kids up for soccer if they hate running.

At last weekend’s outdoor game, Simon’s team was thoroughly dismantled by the opposing side. The coach consoled our side by focusing on how much better the boys played in the second half than the first and how much better they are getting overall.

I wasn’t feeling that generous. I was mostly miffed that at least three players on Simon’s team seemingly had no get-up-and-go. To paraphrase the Bull Durham quote I stole, they lollygagged up the field to maintain possession, they lollygagged their way to space for passing, and they lollygagged their way to get back on defense. They were a team of lollygaggers.

I can understand how the non-aggressive child can grow into soccer. I can understand how the uncoordinated child can get better through soccer. I can understand how the kid who won’t pass will learn to share the ball more with age (though admittedly it ticks me off). But for the life of me I don’t understand why parents of kids who dislike running and/or the kids who dislike running themselves would pick a sport that largely involves running at speed with few interruptions.

If you don’t like running, this is not your sport! Try baseball. Try golf. Try curling. Just please, please, please get off the soccer field!