Soccer Fame

Isaac played his last game of his first soccer team, the Blue Sharks, this morning. It took him about three games to get into it. He liked practicing because everyone got their own ball. But when all of the children lined up with the same ball as their object, he wanted out. At first, he would only stand on the field and stare at us forlornly while all the other children gathered around the soccer ball that wasn't even moving half of the time. Someone would get a kick in and then the kid clump would move to the new spot to kick each other in the shin guards. I don't know why he didn't think this was fun.

After field-standing came total refusal to step foot on the field. Then, we had good talks about playing on a team and working together and most importantly, hustle. The next game he was back to field-standing, but without the sad look on his face, whenever he was asked to play until he got knocked over once and sat out the rest. The third game, though, he really got into it. We had been practicing at home that morning and he said soccer was fun when it was just Mom trying to get the ball, but he didn't like it when all those other kids were trying to get it. I told him to just pretend that all those other kids were one big Mom. He ran and kicked and cheered just like the pros. After the game, he told me, "I didn't even have to pretend that those other kids were one big Mom, I was just brave." He even scored a goal in each of the next two games. Very exciting.