Superstitions

May 27, 2016

Superstitions

Yesterday’s post received a lot of commentary from close friends and family members. Mostly women. “Don’t feel that your texts are bad when you send them to (the 20yo),” or “Are you ok?” In all honesty, I’m quite superstitious. Having not sent a text of encouragement since the tournament began, I’m feeling that now I can’t. They won again last night. And I can’t possibly switch things up at this point.

I’m a finger crosser. I’m sure my early stages of arthritis are a direct result of watching 28 years of baseball.

I married a baseball player. And my superstitions didn’t come from him. Actually, my mother passed them along to me long ago. She roots for the underdog. She crosses her fingers. She uses her “magic” to get strikeouts. She truly believes in Karma, and that the “better man will win”. And most of all, she knows you can’t be the one to break the luck.

So when you see me with my fingers in my pockets or tucked under my arms, you know what’s going on.

May 26, 2016

The Green Light

It’s been a long season. Traveling to Texas, Delaware, Long Island, and of course, Brookline. And now, it’s tournament time, and I’m home with the 12yo. Priorities. What’s made it so hard is leaving the 20yo alone. I mean radio silence alone. No texts, no phone calls, nothing.

He’s playing in his first conference tournament and he doesn’t need his mother sending him little quips and quotes about “pick your head up”, or “have fun today”. (Yes, I was sending these daily). I made this decision on my own. Believe me, I don’t like it. Dare I say, I’m learning to let go.

We spend countless hours raising our children, watching their every move, thinking we can influence all of their decisions. When, in reality, we can’t. They make their decisions. He’ll take that pitch if he wants to. He’ll choose to steal second. (Please note, his coach gave him the “green light”). He’ll spend all of his travel money on the first meal because he knows we will give him more. (Of course his dad is at the tournament, they have a solid understanding of boundaries.)

Maybe it’s time I gave him the “green light”. To make decisions on his own. To fend for himself. He’s clearly been doing it without me all Freshman year of college. Why do we feel this insatiable need to always be telling our children what to do? I don’t play baseball, never have.

Sure I was 20yo once, and had a very good time making good and bad decisions. My mother didn’t check in with me unannounced via text, or worse yet, have Google Alerts on me. No, I had to call her on a landline phone, or write a letter! Times have changed. Parenting has changed.

Give your kids the gift of the “green light”. Put your phone down and let them reach out to you. They will always need you.

You need to find a way when you don’t always need them.

May 6, 2016

The Fan

When you live in New England it’s a known fact that you are either a Yankees fan or a Red Sox fan. Clearly, I am not a Yankees fan. Never have been even when we didn’t live here.

I have watched the suffering closely since 1986. I admit, I was a Mets fan at age 16, until that fateful game and the sox took my heart. Yes, I no longer rooted for the Mets to win the World Series that year. That year, that fateful year, I turned a corner and committed myself a Red Sox fan. And the true suffering began.

Ten years later I found myself living the dream. I was surrounded by sufferers like me. Die-hard fans who truly believed in their home team. When the 20yo was born, he too was dragged down the path, I bought him those cute Red Sox baby t-shirts, complete with wood bat and baby glove. (Ok, he was born into a baseball family, the husband a head baseball coach.)

When he was only 8 months old he attended his first game. All we could afford was one ticket in the bleachers, so of course, a baby doesn’t count! Dressed in a cute little baby boy blue overalls, they “sat” in the bleachers. Dead center. Under the hot sun. (This is when I let you know that both the husband and the 20yo are extremely, well, pale).

They lasted four innings. Not sure if the Sox won or not, but it was, nevertheless, his first game. We had the opportunity to enjoy many more games. But I never attended the games. You know what I’m talking about. The Red Sox vs. the Yankees. It’s epic to watch on TV. “Yankees Suck” t-shirts and shouts from the grandstands. Oh of course, NESN ensures the viewer gets the whole picture.

Winning the World Series was a dream come true. The 20yo and I were home, he was only 8 at the time, along with the girl who was just a baby at the time. Watching under a full moon, they won, they finally won the World Series. Was the suffering over? No, not so fast. There were more wins to come. And more baseball to watch. More t-shirts, now baby Red Sox dresses (not my purchase), and more love for the Sox. We joined the parades. We relished in the victories.

My favorite part about being a Red Sox fan is Sunday Night Baseball. Nothing for me was better than listening to Joe Morgan and Jon Miller. Sure they weren’t well liked. Joe Morgan wasn’t everyone’s favorite “grumpy” analyst. But I learned more about baseball from him. Out they went after 21 years of baseball on Sunday night. They brought in Bobby Valentine. The guy who couldn’t hold down a job had replaced my baseball professor, Joe Morgan.

One year later the baseball Gods turned on me again. Bobby Valentine became the Manager of the Red Sox. I panicked. What was I to tell the children? How could I explain this debacle to my mother? More suffering. Painful, painful suffering. 2012 was a tough year. The Sox only won 5 out of 17 games against the Yankees that year. I couldn’t watch the suffering. Last place.

How quickly another firing came for the ousted Valentine to my pleasure! Enter the hero, from the bullpen. Literally. The rivalry flared again. The love of the game came back. Not because they won the World Series again, but because the game became more important. The rivalry found its place back in my heart. By the way the Red Sox won 13 against the Yankees in 2013.

A fan through and through, I still watch Sunday Night Baseball. I still watch as many games as I can on NESN. I have the MLB app on my phone now. Game time 7:05pm. Against the Yankees.

April 24, 2016April 24, 2016

Keep Your Chin Up!

“Strike three, your out!” That phrase has so many connotations. Clearly, in baseball, your out, but that’s just one at bat. In life, it could land you prison for life in some states. And in friendships, like life, it can mean the time has come to end a long friendship. But does it really?

Is it that we only have the patience for three? “Good things come in threes.” My mother always told me. She always took the positive approach. So why is it that we look at three strikes as a negative? Baseball players adjust for the next time they’re at bat. Why can’t we do that in life? Adjust? Look at the positive?

Baseball players who are able to put their last strike out behind them can move on, adjust, and prepare to get that next hit. Focus. Determination. Concentration. Apply these things to life and those “strikes” become lessons learned. A strike in life is not a bad thing, it’s just another point in time in which things didn’t go your way.

Just get ready for your next at bat. Your next opportunity to adjust. But always remember, you can always strike out again.

April 6, 2016April 7, 2016

Baseball weather

It’s as though Mother Nature is bi-polar. Literally. The polar winds have come down from Canada and frozen us once more. New England weather can be sunny and 70 one day and snowing, windy and cold the next. Typical baseball weather.

While the days are getting longer, so is the winter. Last winter’s record snowfall had a good excuse for ongoing cold and snow. This winter not so much. We had maybe 23″ of snow. In spurts. No real shoveling for me this winter. I let the sun do the work. It seemed as though Spring was going to arrive early. Not so fast. Last weekend it snowed. This week, it’s been 24 degrees at night. I finally got the aching, sneezing, coughing, stuffy nose I had avoided all winter. Sudafed take me away.

Desperately trying to keep warm I wrap myself in my World Series Red Sox blanket, which, opening day in Cleveland was postponed due to snow. Oh, baseball season. It can’t come any sooner, and yet, I recall opening day at Fenway in years past. 35 and rainy, flats, no socks. Big mistake. That was the last time I did that!

Now, I will watch from my computer at work. I’ll wait until July when it finally warms up!

November 19, 2009April 8, 2016

‘Ol Bessie

Ahhh, Wednesday. Not sure how I approach this day of jump, middle of the week, or the day from hell? Wednesday’s I drive 60 miles to take my son and his teammate to hockey practice. I get to fight the good fight of the Boston traffic going South and North. I have always wondered how that works, traffic both ways. I rush them down to practice, a 1/2 or or sometimes 45 minutes early, against their wishes, but I know in order to get through the traffic and pick up his sister by 6pm at the after-school program, they have to suck it up. Ahhh, Wednesday.

My week is generally planned around this special day. Special in that I get to spend quality time with two teenagers who mearly grunt and text message one another while they are less than 16 inches apart. When I pick up Charlie’s teammate and friend Zack, I ask the same questions, hoping to get some conversation from these boys. Now Zack is a great kid, as the weeks have passed he plays me like a fiddle engaging in my tete á tete. “How was school today Zack?”, I ask hoping for a sentence longer than one word. “Actually, it was great Mrs. McConnell. Today, I had a really nice day. Thanks for asking.” What, what, who is this? Oh the joys of conversation. Do I continue, or do I relish in the fact that he didn’t just grunt a “good” under his voice-changing breath?

I’ll take it. My Wednesday is fulfilled. Now I head into the traffic. I would love to calculate the miles put on my car over the course of the hockey season. My Ford Explorer has 210,000 miles (most of which was driving to and from a job 40 miles from our home). Now, she, (Bessie, I affectionately call her, or Big Blue), has retired from driving to those hockey tournaments outside a 250 mile radius. My husband fears Bessie will not make it much longer.

She’s got good fight in her. She’s been to Montreal, Quebec, Rochester, Providence, Stamford, and of course, nearly every MDC rink in eastern Massachusetts. She’s toured much of the South Shore for Baseball trips, but was left behind when we drove to Virginia Beach for the AAU National Tournament. It may have been a result of her lack of air conditioning, or simply the noises in the back tend to over deliver their sound over the music on the radio. We’re careful where Bessie goes now.

My favorite part of Bessie is her ability to house so much crap to keep my six year old content. As we travel from place to place, taking in as many dinners on the road as an amateur hockey team, we collect plenty of restaurant crayons. I wish just once, someone would supply colors other than red, blue, green and yellow. I’ll survive though. I keep a basket of “art supplies” in the back, tucked away next to the three or four fleece blankets, extra winter coats, and of course the travel potty seat. You laugh, but when you have a girl, they come in handy!

I’m pretty convinced Bessie looks forward to the switchover. This is the time when the basket and items in the car switchover from hockey to baseball, or vice versa. This, this is the time Bessie gets a good cleaning. I even think she runs better for a day or so. (Noises not so loud, or maybe I am just turning the radio up a little louder?) Fleece blankets are replaced with large blankets to act as a picnic blanket. The “tent” I purchased for $20 dollars goes alongside the pop up chairs. (I highly advise the purchase of a pop-up tent to keep little ones occupied at baseball games. Baseball, as you know, has no clock…

Yes, Bessie has a good life. International explorer that she is, she keeps chugging along. And, I have to say, no car payment leaves me more money to take the kids out to eat and score those free crayons.

November 17, 2009April 7, 2016

New Teacher

So, every six weeks a new session begins at Gymnastics. And every first day of the new session is a smattering of mothers mumbling under their breath the anger of the inconsistency of the teaching staff. What gives? Why is it the fault of the Gymnastics school that the teachers have changed? This is a phenomena I do not understand.

I dropped my daughter off yesterday afternoon 5 minutes late to Gymnastics class (as always). She popped a kiss to me and bounced right into the warm-ups. Behind me was a mother cursing loud enough for just a few of us to capture what it was she was complaining about…”New Teacher! She was just getting used to the other one, now they change, dammit. She’s all out of sorts…” She went on for a while, hoping to find some sympathy in the room.

None to be found here. Now, I know, perhaps her child has special needs and requires the consistency in their lives. Well, not so much for this little gymnast. She’s my daughters age, and has been going to the classes as long as my daughter has. No excuses mom. I watched from day one this little girl clinging to her mother, and mom coddling her in return. Come on! Break the umbilical cord already.

Why do parents feel this abandonment? Yes, it is the parent who is feeling abandoned. Why would you put your child in the class, angry they won’t let go, then smile casually as you hand a screaming , crying, miserable child to a Gymnastics Teacher? In my world children are this way because 1) We allow them to do this and don’t follow through on our actions, and 2) they simply are not ready for an extracurricular activity without the womb.

Don’t sign your children up for activities unless you can let go. Please, don’t watch the class, unless you’ve been invited in. It’s like watching paint dry and you will only critique the way they are working with your child. The gymnastics academy my daughter attends has two “viewing windows”. They are 24″ x 24″ total. This is for a reason. Take the hint.

Six weeks comes and goes. Teachers, instructors, coaches, come and go when you sign-up for extracurricular activities that are on a cycle. Think before you sign-up. Have a positive attitude towards these people who have the patience to work with your little one. And, wait until they are truly ready for you to let go.

November 16, 2009April 7, 2016

The Bleacher Butt

It’s been nearly 10 years in the making, but I’ve finally made it. I finally brought one of those handy dandy seat cushions to a game. You’d think I’d know better. After all, every Grandparent who ever attended any grandchild’s sporting event owns at least two or three. They even would offer me one, but I’d decline, suffering the wrath of my bleacher butt.

And so it goes. The first edition of bleacherbutt. You all know who you are, you are the dedicated, or not so perhaps dedicated, parents of children who relish in extracurricular activities, focused on the world of sports. Yes, my dear friends, you know who you are, and we all share a dream, that our child will outgrow his need for competitive sport.

Where would that leave us? That’s why we have multiple children, sanctioned perfectly three years and 2 months apart in order to generate at least 20 years of sporting events. Whether it’s good fortune or not, I have two children, ages 13 and 6. The 13 year old is the sport equivalent to 3 children, whereas the 6 year old would much prefer painting over perfunctory athletics. (Though, I do believe she has athletic prowess, however, we have not uncovered it yet)

That’s what we parents do, watch with great intent while our little ones try to win a game. When my son was 4 he started tee-ball. Now 4 is just crazy, as I didn’t start any sports until after I was 6. But, as I came to find out, we were actually late to the game (pun intended). Most of his friends had started soccer at age 3. They were the Brewers. Now, my son has a bit of an advantage. His father, the head baseball coach at a local university, placed a bat in his hand at age two months. I have to admit, he does have a natural swing. (My daughter on the other hand has no clue on how to swing a bat!)

The T-ball league was great. Each team consisted of 15 players, all who got to bat, all got to be in the field, at the same time, and no outs counted, unless you played the Brewers. These guys could turn double plays! They were amazing, and they were only 4. My son and his friends who understood the game of baseball were furious when they made their three outs, and had to stay until everyone batted. It was confusion on both sides.

What are we teaching them? My husband eventually boycotted the games, as I sat there, with my blanket in the cold New England spring. I wished I had that bleacher cushion back then. Nine years ago this all began. Along with baseball we added hockey at age 5. That’s when the real fan in me was exposed. I taped all of his first year. It’s somewhere on some camcorder tape in the house. That was the last year I ever taped a hockey game.

So, what is bleacherbutt all about? It’s about the dedication parents put into the games their children play. It’s about how fanatical we parents get when we’re at a game. It’s about how adults get lost in the competitive spirit of the game, and lose sight of what its all about. It’s about a mother who goes every Monday to get her son’s skates sharpened at the same place week after week. It’s about car pools and “stinky hockey boys”. It’s about making life work around your kids sporting event. It could be about you. It could be about your parents who also join you in the stands week after week.

Welcome. Welcome to bleacherbutt. Join me, share your stories.