Soccer and Internships

Things have continued to be challenging with the Girl's soccer summer. First, she yelled at me to be quiet ("Shut up" were her exact words!) during the game (when I wasn't even talking to her BTW) and got duly punished by not getting to go to a party that day.

Next, at another game, she shouted at her teammates to "get the fucking ball!" I said "Girl! Watch your language!" The coach asked what she said, and I just said she cursed. He thought about it and said, "It's nothing I wouldn't have said. Just let her play." At home she did get punished, however, because we had an agreement about cursing, that we wouldn't censor her TV or movie watching at this age as long as she doesn't say those words.

I told her I like it that she cares about the game, I don't mind if she has an edge, but she can't go around cursing like a sailor! So she'd made her peace with not seeing R rated movies for awhile, when she discovered that a TV show she liked was rated TV-14. And she's 13. Arghhhhhhhh! She didn't even know there was such a thing.

So the next game, instead of cursing, she took off running after getting scored on and pushed a boy on the other team! I knew as soon as she took off that she was very angry, but it was a long way to run, and I saw her rethinking the whole thing by the time she got there. But she couldn't just stop after running all that way, so all she did was give him a little push. But still. She got a red card and miraculously, the kid on the other team got a yellow card. So I guess the ref knew that the boy had done something to provoke her.

I wasn't going to punish her because I figured she got a red card and had hopefully learned another lesson. When she came over to where I was sitting, she was crying and saying I didn't hear what the boy had been saying to her. I didn't really say anything, but then she demanded to go home. Well, I didn't like that idea at all. It was bad enough she could no longer help her team (and she's the sweeper), but to just leave?

But she was very upset and beseeching me "Mom can't you just try to understand?" when it was halftime. I decided to go ask the coach what he thought.

But when I got to him, he said, "Go ask the ref to change it to a yellow card!"

So I did. He knew me because I was the one who paid him and gave him the cards at the beginning of the game, so I ran over there and asked him if he couldn't please change it to a yellow card because the boys were saying bad things to her and upset her, but she's very sorry and will never do it again. And he said OK.

I didn't know if he meant OK, go away, or OK I'll change it. But he did say OK. Like I said, this league is somewhat casual.

But the coach went to the other side and I couldn't get the girl to go onto the field or to see the coach! She insisted she was out no matter what I said. So I stalked over to the other side and asked the coach if she shouldn't be in since the ref said ok. He said, "The ref said OK?" and I said yes. So he shouted "Girl!" but she didn't come over. He told me to go get her.

So I stalked back and I was SO, so mad at her. If she didn't get her butt into that game I was planning all sorts of punishment and possible torture. But I went and told her that the coach wanted to see her. She said she was too embarrassed to go back, but I told her it was a better way to get out her energy than crying.

So she went over and after some discussion with the ref and a kid on the other team and mutual apologizing, she got back into the game. She played well and there were no other incidents or issues.

The coach didn't get angry with her, because frankly he wishes some of the other girls cared as much as she does. But her brother advised her to just take her anger out by playing harder or better. Her father told her that letting the other team get to her head is letting them take her out of the game - she's taking HERSELF out of the game. I told her that she needs to learn to control her temper or I'm going to send her to a counselor, which I totally mean, because I'm hyper sensitive right now to violence and cursing and people not being able to control their tempers. (ie my sister)

And any time we get everything together and take her to a game, we're staying for the WHOLE game (unless the police are called.)

Thankfully things didn't escalate this last weekend, but she did manage to lose the bag with her cleats and shin guards. It was around 7am and we were a little cranky anyway. K kept asking her where they were and she got frustrated and yelled at him to let her think. So K and I were desperately searching her room, our cars, etc,. and every time we went into the living room she was standing there, thinking.

She never did find them, so we moved on to Plan B - my old cleats from my brief coaching career. A week later we still have no idea where they are.

She claims I probably moved them and don't remember because I'm getting older and that's the kind of thing I do now. Unfortunately, this could be true.

Meanwhile, there's the Boy

During his spring break we put together his resume and he applied for a lot of internships at once. One company in Santa Monica was interested in him, but he wasn't ready to start yet as he had to finish his semester at school. When he finished his term, he emailed her again but this time got no response.

When he got home he started applying for jobs like crazy, but seemed to give up on internships. I looked on Craigslist and found some and emailed them to him, but he didn't follow up on them. It made me sad, because it reminded me of basketball - how he gave up at the first sign of an obstacle.

I hate to see him give up when things get difficult, but I also remember how hard these things were for me at his age. So I offered to help him, because it's very easy for me - being in marketing and sales for all these years. So this time when I searched Craigslist, when I saw something interesting I'd just send an email and his resume from his email account.

I only did this a few times, and miracle of miracles, he got an internship in nearby Burbank! SO much closer than Santa Monica! So he's all happy and thanking me, but honestly it was his resume that got it for him. And being available immediately seems to be somewhat important in getting internships.

I'm hoping once he gets some confidence he'll be less easily discouraged. I tried to show him how putting it out there and just trying can actually get you what you want, so hopefully he will learn to keep trying.

Next, K and I are in a dilemma regarding getting another car. I don't want to keep driving the Boy around and would like to get another car that's good on gas, but I've been meeting a lot of resistance from K. Finally he said that he should be the one to get a new car, and he wanted an El Camino. So I found him one in our neighborhood, and he thought about it, and it just doesn't make any sense gas-wise. So hopefully we've decided to get another small car - now I just need to make it happen.

I have to say that I've been loving life lately - soccer in the daytime and Laker games at night. It's been a lot of fun.