team player

My son spent his summer rising at 5am to get to football practice by 6am. When September came, he went to practice every weekday afternoon until 6pm and sometimes on Saturday mornings as well. Thanksgiving has always been a favorite holiday for him. He usually goes with his father to Oregon and hangs out with beloved cousins. This Thanksgiving, he stayed home. Alone. His team had made the championship for the first time in forty years, and even on Thanksgiving morning, they were on the field, practicing.

I watched all this with parental wonder. I don’t get sports, period. I spent most of my P.E. hours in high school feigning cramps, and I associate football especially with a whole bunch of things I am against. Like running into people and hurting them. I went to his games when he was a freshman and sophomore, patiently waiting for this reactionary phase of being raised by a Pagan - activist - therapist - artist - mom to be over. I imagined that by junior year he might find theater, art or the chess club more his style. But no, here he still is, more dedicated than ever, now on the varsity team.

My son is easy going and perfectly happy to not attend to homework, garbage removal, or room cleaning without maternal threat. Focused, driven, disciplined, and hardworking are not attributes I’d assign to him. And yet, this sport I abhor has brought these traits to light. Is this world not full of mystery?

Last year, on the junior varsity team, he was the quarterback. It took me awhile to get that this position was akin to high priestess, the center of the circle, the Grand Poobah of the game. For awhile, I just understood it to be the position where everyone tries to knock you down. This should have clued me in. This year, on varsity, he was in a different position, and given that he broke his elbow the first week of school, he didn’t play for most of the season, and when he was healed, he was demoted to second string. This means not playing much, if at all, during the games.

Nevertheless, even with the broken elbow, he went faithfully to every practice and to every game. Standing on the sidelines, he’d watch and cheer on his teammates. He stayed home during Thanksgiving, knowing that odds were good that he might not play that Saturday, the game that would decide if they would be in the final championship. He ended up being in the game for about five minutes, and thankfully, they won.

Last weekend was the final championship. Again, he was in the game for mere minutes, and again, they won. He is now part of a championship team, the first time his school has held this position.

And I, his mother, am amazed at the way things can unfold. My son, the football player, turns out to hold at sixteen a whole slew of values, and to practice them, in a way that I have spent a lifetime aspiring to. He is the quintessential team player, not doing it for the glory or the ego, but the experience of being part of the whole. He got up early in the mornings, practiced late into the afternoons, and forfeited all kinds of fun, making peace with being primarily on the sidelines.

Soon, he will receive a championship ring, something I hope he wears proudly for a lifetime. He is a champion of a season that he primarily could not play, and when he could, he didn’t play much. Not being the star or the Grand Poobah, he nevertheless, kept showing up. Throughout his life, my wish is that his ring reminds him of this mighty accomplishment.

His smile, upon his team winning, is the one every parent hopes to see on their child’s face.

A few nights ago, we went to see one of his friends perform the lead role in the school’s production of “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”. All during the performance I relished my contentment. Things are just as they should be, although in a different form than I could ever imagine. And isn’t that just how it should be?