No It All

It’s hard to believe we’ve been avid participants in the youth sports world for at least a decade.  I started Jake at Off the Wall soccer when he was only about a year and a half old.  He just ran around where the coach pointed.  I was like, “Yeah, he doesn’t know colors.  Or numbers.  Or English.”

When he was probably about four he “played” on his first soccer team with the Jaguars.  Yes played is in quotes because I mostly remember him resisting the idea of playing or going on the field or kicking the ball.  It’s been nothing but up since the Jaguars and we’ve been proud fans across so many sports and teams that I’ve certainly lost count.

We’ve played baseball with the Riverdogs, the Scrappers, the Yankees, the Hooks, Cal Poly Red, and the Tigers.  We’ve played basketball for the LA Lakers and the Utah Jazz.  And of course flag football for the Georgia Bulldogs and the Kansas City Chiefs.  Nate’s played soccer for both Bayern Munich and Real Madrid, just this year.  Leading up to such esteemed teams the boys have played for the Awesome Panthers, the Gray Ghosts, the Stars, the Raptors, the Legends, the Mustangs, and the Lancers.

Last year, Jacob’s soccer team was called Diablo Sauce.  It was quite a mouthful.  I found “Go Sauce!” to be the most effective cheer.  Jacob’s coach was also the coach for one of the Raptors arch rivals– a team called the Unripe Tomah-toes (said with an Australian accent).  Their jerseys were green… with envy when we beat them.  HA.  I think this particular coach prides himself in having teams with memorable names.

I came back from this year’s BOLD conference to find Nate’s team had chosen “FBI” as our name.  Which was a bit unusual until I asked what Jake’s team was called and they told me… wait for it…

Inflation.

“What?”

And Coach tells me, “I told them to pick a name that strikes fear into the hearts of their opponents.”

We just got home from the finale of our first CCU tournament of the season.  My throat hurts I’m so horse.  Get it, we’re the mustangs… sheesh tough crowd.  But I totally killed it with my new nickname for the head ref that looks like Colonel Sanders– K Ref C.  I’ll be here all night, folks.

So yesterday we started at Damon against the Lemoore Arsenal Gunners.  Good thing they were about as consistent as the real Arsenal and we won 5-2.  According to my handy dandy score keeping sheet for Nate’s future glory day reliving, he scored 2 goals, took 4 shots, and had 5 heart-stopping saves of various flavors as goalie for the entire second half.

Our second game was up against Kings County 10B Orange out at Cuesta at approximately dinner time.  This is generally not our team’s best time of day.  We were down 3-0 and made it 3-1 at the half.  We battled back and tied 3-3.  Nate had one goal, an assist, and 3 shots.

This morning we woke up bright and early so Jacob could work his 7am minimum wage gig as a field marshal.  It was definitely a more cushy job than manning the Goodwill Donation trailer in the dirt parking lot near school.  He did well given his ride dropped him off 45 minutes late and the ambiguous job responsibilities.  He was especially effective pointing out that the opposing team had two #17’s… and then two number 8’s.

Our first game was up against Davis Legacy Black.  This is not the Davis Legacy to be scared of; I think that’s the white one.  In any case, we won 4-0 and Nate had a hat trick.  Looks like he made all his shots.

Then hours and hours went by, we fed Nate leftover Panda Express for lunch, we watched Man City almost lose to Newcastle and we had a visit from Ralph, Kili, and Thurman the little Frenchie.  We packed up again and headed back to Damon Mad House Garcia for the finale against California Magic, which appears to be a fancy name for the east bay town of Orinda.

Oh this game.  They score.  We score.  They score.  We score.  It was 2:2 at half.  We go back out and it’s more of the same.  With what seems like 2 minutes left, Nate scores and we’re up 4-3.  It was one of those movie goals where we all gasp and cheer and he does the Ronaldo jump celebration.  Someone asks how they can get his autograph… it’s hilarious and exciting. Nate has his second hat trick of the day, a nice corner kick assist, and a series of memorable free kicks.  And then in this terrible slow motion play, the guy gets past our defense and fires it at our goalie and bam, we’re back to 4-4.  The minutes are ticking down and we’re dreading the dreaded PK’s ending.  Good news, there’s a ten minute overtime.  Bad news, we’re still tied.

And we go to Penalty Kicks.

Eliot starts out as he’s also playing goal.  It sails over the top and he’s pretty devastated.  But then the first Magic guy shoots on him and misses to the right.  We’re back in it.  Nate takes the next PK and makes it top left.  I’m not sure what all happened after that but Beckett makes his shot, Spanner has a beautiful low shot.  And then Noah takes our final shot and makes it and the field erupts into a huge crowd of jumping cheering mustangs.

This afternoon on our way to the game we talk about PK’s.  Nate tells me he really doesn’t like taking them and has only made 1 of 5 he’s taken.  I’m not sure this is true but who knows?  What I do know is it’s all in his head.  He tells me when he’s practicing with his friends it’s so easy.

Today Nate faced his fear– volunteered to take the PK– and changed his confidence.  That just might be the best prize of all.

On Tuesday I took Jacob to Dr. Lindsey’s to get his braces on.  I stand corrected, his Invisilign.  Only eighth graders in the ’20’s would have the option to unapologetically wear masks covering half their faces and have the option of clear teeth straightening.  It’s so unfair.

As I took him in to sit in the chair I most certainly declared, “I remember the day I got my braces on and it was one of the worst days of my life.”   I still stand by that statement.  I remember Dr. Matlack’s teenage teeth straightening factory.  And I remember him gluing the torture devices to my teeth toward the end of sixth grade so my dad didn’t lose his flexible spending account dollars.  Eye roll.  That night we went to Chinese food and I couldn’t even chew a grain of rice.  A grain of rice!  I was hangry and miserable and I let everyone know it.

Meanwhile the boys were at Kennolyn all of last week and Nate nonchalantly mentions how he lost a tooth.  Oh and Jake did, too.  Nate was smart enough to guard his lost tooth, combine it with two more that have been in a drawer, and was rewarded with a crisp 5 bucks from the fairy.  Jacob doesn’t know what happened to his tooth.

He thinks he spit his final loose tooth into the dirt.

In August of 2010 I made this list of goals:

1. With James, raise outstanding children.
2. Travel the world.
3. Build a house.
4. Own a business.
5. Give back.

I just left the county building with my arms filled with a huge pile of approved plans and after countless years, an official building permit.

I got into my car, rolled down the windows, and pulled out onto the street.  Mr. Jones started playing as if on queue.  I turned it up loud, let the tears run down my face, and drank it in.

Is it a problem when you’re getting dressed and you find yourself thinking, “Have I had this shirt longer than I’ve had Jacob?

Looks like I’ve answered my own question.

The topic of girls remains taboo in this house.  I’m fairly certain 51% of the world either doesn’t exist or is invisible, not unlike the rollback of our rights by 50 years.  But I digress… I’d never put my sons anywhere near that extremist club.

So girls are an unthinkable topic that of course I love to poke at on occasion.  A few months back I pressed it a bit with Nate and he whipped around snarling, “Well I’m not gay.”  Which I made abundantly clear is totally OK, more than OK, and that our family accepts whoever you love and makes you feel loved.

Today I’m pretty surprised when I pick Nate up at College for Kids and we’re still waiting for Jake.  Nate’s in the backseat and he says, “Mom, there’s this girl in my cooking class.”

“Oh yeah?”  I say casually.  Mentally rubbing my hands together in giddy anticipation.

“She smells like poop.  It’s teeeeerrible.  And she sits right behind me.”

There it is.  The girl talk I’m used to.

I recently watched a home design video professing the importance of a pantry to a well-run household and thus familial bliss.  I’m pretty certain Jacob-the-Bottomless-Pit would agree.

At the Park house we put a pantry cupboard in our laundry room when we renovated the kitchen.  We don’t have any pantry memories from that house as Jake was still on a liquid diet.  On Shasta we had one particular cupboard behind Nate’s high chair next to the dining room.  Basically there was a lot of milling around this cupboard, pointing and attempting to reach the out-of-reach latch that was probably only 3 feet high.  The boys were always picketing and protesting in front of this cupboard.  It’s where we kept the cookies.

Then we moved to the mountain house and the boys quickly mastered the power of moving chairs.  I put the major contraband as high as I could, but this strategy had a short lifespan.  We’d reached the point where you hope all the nutritional training on health and savoring would start to pay off.  At some point I’m hoping they go off to college and aren’t those kids only eating mountains of buttered noodles and cookies.

Now we’ve moved into the barn and it’s the closest thing we’ve ever had to a real pantry.  A wall of shelves with mostly food at eye level.  The challenge is that if there is any Bundaberg ginger beer, Jacob just can’t resist it.  It’s constantly evaporating, evidenced only by the recycling bin.  We’re talking about this over dinner and I’m like, “I can’t buy ice cream and Bundaberg every week because no one can resist it.  My options are to not buy it.  Lock it up.  Or hide it.  I have no other options.”

“Or you can just buy more,” counters Jacob.

I honestly had not considered that.  Sometimes I miss the power of a 3-foot cupboard latch.

Yesterday I finally escaped 12 straight days of lockdown.  12 days of single-parenting house arrest.  I reached my lowest point on the second consecutive Saturday of being trapped in pandemic prison.  I chose to go to Paso where it was 94 degrees and sweat it out in my car while Nate played back-to-back outdoor and indoor soccer games.  Anything to escape the mountain.  I passed some cash out the window to him and he brought me an ice cold Coke.  It was so good.  And now we’ve finally come out the other side.

Back when Jacob missed his chance to go to sixth grade camp, we went to Catalina.  And when Nate’s fifth grade field trip to the Monterey Bay Aquarium turned into a hike up Bishop’s Peak (hugest rip-off for the record), we went to Monterey.  Jacob made it back to the last day of seventh grade– just in time to get his yearbook, turn in his Chromebook, and then come home for me to feed him lunch… again.  It felt quite cosmically unfair that the person who got us into this mess was the first one to escape from it.

Unfortunately Nate never made it back to the last week of school, thus securing his classes’ inevitable loss in the final soccer playoff.  And missing the majority of Sex Ed.

Catalina, Monterey, the Red Light District of Amsterdam?

Yesterday morning before school, Nate informed me, with a bit of giddy trepidation, “Mom today’s the first day of sex ed.”  Love how they save possibly the most important part of the curriculum for the final eight days of school.  And yes, I did sign the permission slip and add three enthusiastic exclamation points next to the “Yes” checkbox.

So I’m pulling out of Laguna, on our way toward his school, “Nate, what’s the big deal?  You luh-uh-uuuuuhve talking about your private parts.”

“Yeah.  But not about the West Virginia.”

Then I say, “The West Virginia??  More like the South Virginia.”

And now we both think we’re so clever.