Confession: I am a terrible soccer mom. I was a little shocked to discover this about myself, but it’s true nonetheless. I didn’t start out this way. I played soccer growing up. My dad coached; my mom watched; my sisters played – it was a family thing. So, when the kids were little, I dutifully signed them up for soccer and volunteered to help coach their teams, but eventually, I realized that I was more interested in the game than they were. Evidence:

So, the kids stopped playing on teams and I stopped coaching. Life went on.

Both kids are pretty athletic (as I am not), and my older child never stopped playing the game with buddies, but he didn’t join a team again until this year. Then, he made the high school team, too. Suddenly, I have an app on my phone and there are uniforms and practices and games and tournaments and so so many emails. I know that this is part and parcel of youth sports, but it turns out, I’m a terrible soccer mom. Evidence:

I ignore a lot of the emails.

The app made me crazy, too, so I made my partner download it.

Which means I really should read the emails.

We are often late to practice. Sometimes it is my fault.

I do not know the names of all the boys on the team. (In fairness to me, my child does not like it when I ask him things like the names of the boys on the team, so I stopped.)

I definitely do not know the parents of the boys on the team.

I often take walks during the outdoor games. 

I often do crosswords during the indoor games.

I accidentally missed today’s semi-final because I was walking (In my defense, my son is injured and was not playing AND I had been told the game was starting later AND I didn’t know that the playoff games were shorter. Which I probably should have known. But whatever.)

The truth is that I’m a little surprised that I don’t want to be more involved, but I don’t. Maybe it’s because he didn’t play for so long or because when he started again this year, he asked me not to watch while he got used to playing again. Mostly, though, it’s because it’s his thing, not mine. One way or another, I’m not really a soccer mom, and I’m making my peace with that.