Soccer time

I don't like the term "soccer mom". It's an innocent enough sounding moniker, but there are so many layers of baggage attached to it implying who you are and what you think that I feel snarly whenever I hear it. Nevertheless, Thomas shouldn't suffer just because a label makes me crazy, so we signed him up for soccer.

Right now, he's in a soccer camp for the 3-5 set. "Coach Danny" seems to understand what it takes to get a four-year-old to actually kick a ball around for an hour. He has them stay on "soccer island" which is surrounded by "sharks and jellyfish", so they shouldn't kick their balls outside of it. They kick their balls through orange cones he calls "dragon teeth" and they often have to get their ball from one end of the "island" to the other, crossing over his "pirate ship" along the way. Thomas goes there all excited and finishes each day pink-cheeked, sweaty, and eager to go back the next day. For me, it's worth the expense to see him getting some exercise that also makes him so happy. However--and this is no dig at men in general, just an observation in a limited subject pool--the dads that seem to come along to the camp have been, uh, less than satisfied with the way the camp is run. "When are they going to do some drills?" one of them asked yesterday. "I took him out of the YMCA soccer camp because they weren't really drilling them and I think this place is even worse!" Another dad saw his little girl get her ball kicked by another kid and shouted at her, "Well, now your ball's gone! Are you happy?" to which his wife replied, "Now that's unnecessary, stop it." He said back, "Well, I think it is necessary. She's needs to learn."

Now let me say again, these kids are between the ages of 3 and 5. Most of them bring little sippy cups to camp as their water source and their shinguards are about the length of one of those rocket popsicles. Am I not expecting enough of Thomas that I'm satisfied with the fact that he goes there and comes home happy and that while his soccer skills will probably still leave much to be desired at the end of the camp, he will still associate "soccer" in his mind with fun and friends? To me, there still seems plenty of time for sports to become intense and competative and I suspect that that will also be fun for Thomas at a certain point, to really test his mettle against other players and have the chance to win something for himself. I don't think that time is now. I think I'm going to wait on his signal to determine when that time is.

Coach Danny is definitely from Jersey. Check out the accent.