I am officially a soccer mom. However, I'm a slacker soccer mom. I got Penguin Girl out the door early so that we could get a reasonable parking spot for her 8:30am soccer game. I was warned by another mom to do this if I didn't want to end up parking at the school next to the park and having a long hike to the field. Although this is the first year that Penguin Girl is participating in an organized sport, I knew enough to bring a folding lawn chair. I also brought a book. I thought, we will be there for almost 90 minutes, I have had a tough week conferencing with each of my students, what a good opportunity to catch up with some leisure reading. Apparently, that is not part of the program.
I started reading when the girls were warming up. Right before the game started, I heard the mom next to me call her daughter over and say, "Ok, go have fun and play hard. Remember, go out and take that ball away. Don't wait for it to come to you. You go and get it! Take it away!" (The girl did have the sense to ask if she should listen to her mom and try to take the ball from her teammates.) I did not give Penguin Girl any sort of pep talk. This woman could be counted on to shout, "Get it! Get it!" each time her daughter got anywhere near the ball. I did not cheer. The mom on the other side of me grabbed my arm at one point to tell me that Penguin Girl just blocked the ball from going into the net. Super. It's not that I'm not interested in how my kid is playing. I just don't need to watch every second she's on the field. She's having fun whether I am watching or not.
I saw Penguin Girl score a very slick goal and gave her two thumbs up. She said she scored twice but I think the second time that she's counting may have been when she kicked the ball into an opposing player and it bounced around and then rolled into the net. Her team, the Fireballs (the girls voted on that), won 8-5.
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