Soccer Memories

 By John McDonnell

In a few weeks my daughter’s soccer career will be over. She plays for a college team, and this is her senior year. Her school is a six hour drive away, so my wife and I have only seen a handful of her games in four years.

We will be driving down to see her play the next two weekends, and it will be an emotional time for us.

Whenever I sit in the stands and see her playing at the furious, physical pace of college soccer, I can’t help but think of the little girl in a ponytail who started playing at four years old on a coed team where the boys wouldn’t pass her the ball, and she seemed more interested in picking dandelions than in playing her position. The ball would routinely pass her by while she stared at cloud formations, and the adults would try to refocus her by jumping up and down on the sidelines and screaming.

Has it really been 17 years since then?

I’ve seen a lot of soccer in the intervening years, and it’s a sport I never played or really cared about before. My high school didn’t even have a soccer team when I was there, and it was a sport I thought was only played by people with names like Reinhard or Carlos.

When your child likes a sport, though, you dutifully learn everything you can about it, and become the world’s biggest fan. I coached my kids in soccer when they were little, trying to hide my ignorance with a few insider terms I learned from books. “One touch!” I’d yell, not really sure what that meant, but it sounded good.

I stopped coaching when the kids were old enough to raise their eyebrows at some of my strategic moves, which was usually when they hit 9 years old.

It’s been a grand adventure, as every part of parenting has been. I’ve had to learn skills I never dreamed I’d learn, play roles I never thought I’d play, speak a language I never knew before.

There have been injuries, games played in the pouring rain or freezing cold, games that were won or lost in the last seconds, stubborn coaches and mean-spirited opponents, medals and trophies won, friendships forged, tears and laughter in abundance. I put thousands of miles on our car shuttling my kids to tournaments, stayed in budget hotels and ate too much fast food. I gave up weekends to man the hot dog stand when our team hosted tournaments, pushed my creaky joints to the limit in backyard workout sessions, shelled out thousands of dollars for uniforms, team fees, equipment, cleats and whatever else my soccer players told me they absolutely had to have.

I’m sure I’ll reflect on that sitting in the stands this weekend. I’ll look at that woman who’s flying down the field with the smile on her face, the same one she had when she was five years old, and I’ll cheer her and wonder at the mystery of time, that it seems like only yesterday when she was picking dandelions in the middle of a soccer field.

I’ll probably shed a tear too.

It’s been a great ride.