There is a trend of repetition in parenthood. We often parent as our parents did. We might expect the same chores that were expected of us, follow the same bed time routines or repeatedly try to drive home the same messages. I witness this often as we drive in the car. From the back seat, one of my boys will declare that he is going to be rich when he grows up. So rich that he will own the world or be a super-duper quadrillionaire. I always say something non-committal like, "yeah, you will" or "I'm not sure that quadrillion is a number." My wife, however, always says the same thing: "what's important is that you have a family that loves you and a roof over your head." I've heard these same words come out of my mother-n-law's mouth countless times. In fact if I wasn't looking (and my wife had a Spanish accent as opposed to an American one) I might think that I was sitting next to my mother-in-law. I also mimmick what I heard when I was younger. I joke with my boys as my parents joked with me. I try to teach my boys to treat others as I was taught by my parents. Sometimes, however, we repeat mistakes with our children that we came upon all by ourselves.
After my first two forays into basketball coaching (coaching my older son when he was in first grade and second grade), I swore to never coach again. I don't think that I have the right demeanor for coaching. I am good working with my boys one on one as an athletic tutor. But put me in a larger situation where I have to work with lots of kids: not so pretty. During my older son's basketball games, I was constantly bitter. I felt cheated. There was an expectation (who comes up with these things?) that all children participating should have equal playing time. This prevented me from playing my son every minute of every game (I was volunteering, right? doesn't that earn my boy some extra playing time?). Of course, I bowed to the expectations; everyone played the same amount. But I was not pleased. I was also disgusted by what I considered an unfair schedule. For some reason, every team that we played beat us by fifty points. The reason was actually that they were better teams who were better coached and who practiced more than we did. But I wasn't going there. I was just angry (not outwardly so, but it left me an unhappy coach/dad). After my first year coaching, I swore never to do it again. That lasted until the next year. Then, I made the same mistake when my son was in second grade. Surely, I would not fall into this trap again.
My younger son's basketball season just ended. It was by far my most successful coaching venture. Six wins and zero defeats. The team's final game was characterized by excellent shooting, great passing and amazing defense. The kids on the team felt pride in their victories and in their improved skills. Certainly, a rousing success- triumphant even. But triumphs don't come easy.
Every Monday evening, I came home after practice hoarse, from trying to be heard over the aerobics class on the adjacent court, and bone tired from trying to instruct ten kindergarteners in the finer points of basketball. Also particularly fatiguing was the seemingly unending work of trying to achieve amity amongst my players. Five and six-year olds are a tempestuous lot; it doesn't take much to send tempers a-flying. In coaching my son's team, I was confronted with age-old basketball issues. Players who don't pass, players who are too aggressive, players so fascinated by the nets of the baskets that they would hang on them rather than play. I also had to deal with discipline issues. During one practice I asked my son to demonstate for the team how to dribble to the half-court line and back. He refused. "Come on," I pleaded. He stuck his tongue out at me and ran away. Other times, children would intentionally whip the ball at each other's heads (or way over their heads). Bounce pass drills became who could bounce the ball highest drills. Correcting these misbehaviors was made all the more difficult and frustrating because I had to do it over the steady beat of the techno music coming from the aerobics class. Of course shouting over the music was probably preferable to my competing with the amplified voice of the chirpy instructor.
Sounds brutal, huh? So how did I find myself trapped once again in the labyrinth of pain that is youth basketball coaching? The league in which my boy played was organized through the YMCA. Each team was to have a coach provdied by the Y. I would get to sit back and admire my son's athletic acument from a safe distance. I said as much to our friends, J and M, whose son, N, was on the team with my boy. "I am so glad that I am not coaching this season. I coached before and found it very frustrating. It will be liberating to watch the action from afar."
Sadly, the coach who was supposed to manage our team had to back out. So did his replacement.
The teams viability seemed in jeopardy. "More time to practice soccer," I thought. My older son and I were doing just that while my wife took our younger boy to a practice to be held by an interim coach. The interim coach, although a very nice lady, had many other duties at the Y and was too quiet to work with five and six-year olds. Something needed to be done. My wife volunteered me as a coach. "Are you sure?" M asked my wire, "last week Jonah went on at great length as to how pleased he was not to be coaching." My wife told the Y that she would have to check with me to see if I was available. But the die was cast. It was only fair for me to coach my younger boy as I had already coached his brother. Besides, I thought, this time will be different....
And it was different. When my older boy played, basketball was his only afterschool activity (from 3:30-4:30). The practices occurred at his school. My younger boy had Tae Kwan Do, offered at his school, from 3:30-4:15 His practices happened, at the Y, from 5:00-6:00. Just thinking about his day makes me tired as I'm writing this. This sentiment was not lost on him. He was tired and expressed this every Monday. He became quite adept at thinking of reasons that he needed to skip basketball. "Daddy," he earnestly told me one Monday before Tae Kwan Do, "my lip has been bothering me a little today. I don't think I should practice." Another week, he had a slight rip in his shirt. "Can't practice," he reasoned. I made him attend the practices, of course. But he doesn't give up easily and is quite inventive. His reasons for not being able to practice contnued to flow. His shoes were too tight, his teeth hurt, he was worried about the depleting Ozone layer. Despite his protestations, he did practice and he did well. The team did well. And so I suppose, I did well. But I absolutely promise never to repeat this mistake. No more coaching for me. Until next year.