(I wrote this yesterday. I’m too lazy to change any of the tenses. So here you go:)

Not only a soccer mom, but the TEAM MANAGER of our team.

When I registered the kids in soccer late last spring, there was a checkbox for if you’re interested in being a team manager. I hovered over the checkbox, and I swear to GOD I did not check it, but I did think about checking it. In the end, I’m pretty sure I left it unchecked and said to myself, “If they need team managers, they’ll send out an email, and maybe THEN I’ll volunteer.”

So I was shocked & stunned when the weekend before soccer started (we’re on week 2 now), an email came from Jocelyn’s team coach saying hi and mentioned that I’m the team manager.

I emailed him back and said there must have been a mistake.

There wasn’t any, and it certainly wasn’t his fault if there was, so after he reassured me that yes, my name was listed on teh list they gave him, I just went with it.

I mean, all I have to do is organize the snack schedule, right? And plan the end of season party (very low key, bring donuts, head to a pavillion, take up a collection for the coaches, no big deal).. and hand out the picture packets to the parents the week before pictures.

This is easy. I can totally do this, I thought. Sure, I totally wandered around the field last spring searching for the field for Ethan’s first soccer game like an EEDIOT, but that was then. This is now. I can do it. I can be a soccer mom.

Fast forward (or backwards i guess) to the first soccer practice last week.

Unfortunately for us, Ethan’s practice is at a different school then Jocelyn’s. They are both at 6pm, but in different places. So we arranged for James to take Ethan to his, and I would take Jocelyn to hers. I was going to pick them up from school, get them home, fed, changed, and ready to go.

At about 5:37 as I was still en route to home, both kids in the car, and James called me to ask where the hell I was, I replied that he’d better get all their stuff and meet us at the school where Ethan’s practice was being held (closer to me than Jocelyn’s.) He did, and we did, and it wasn’t until 5:55 that I pulled out of the parking lot and headed to the school where Jocelyn’s practice was being held. We arrived at about 6:02 and I hurriedly changed her out of her school clothes and into her soccer gear (including cleats!) and then headed off to find her field.

Now this field is nothing like the game day field. That field is huge, and has like.. oh, 117 fields on it. The school practice fields only had 5ish fields, and it was the same field that Ethan had practiced on in the spring, so I was pretty confident that we’d find her field easily.

Which did not happen. I had a vivid flashback of Ethan’s first game in the spring, as I walked up to the various groups and asked, “which field is this? What team are you? Who’s your coach’s name?” and drew a blank for each one. Time was ticking along and I was still in my nice work clothes, trotting around a school field feeling like an idiot. Someone finally filled me in that our field was on the OTHER SIDE OF THE SCHOOL… a fact that our coach had actually emailed the entire team and I ignored, thinking, “oh i know that field, i’ll know where to go.”

So finally, we trot off across the field, backt hrough the parking lot across another field to the backside of teh school where finally we arrived at our team’s practice. at 6:15.

Some soccer mom/team manager I am, eh? 🙂

Ahh well. Today I’m leaving in plenty of time, and I’ve dutifully printed out schedules with each week’s game time, what side our kids’ jersey’s are supposed to be on (blue or gold), who’s in charge of the snack, and what field we’ll be playing on.

It only takes away some of the stupid.

I always feel odd being a “soccer mom,” (and I obviously like to make fun of myself as such,) but the truth is, when you’re at soccer practice or a game and you’re watching your kid run around trying to kick the ball, you forget all about the surburban soccer mom stereotypes that caused you to want to dye your hair pink in the first place just to FEEL A LITTLE DIFFERENT OH MY GOD WTFBBQ… (ahem) and you just watch your kid having fun…

and you start to have fun to 🙂

– amy (you’ll still never see me with a soccer mom bumper sticker)