Five on Friday: The Reluctant Mom of Athletes Challenge

I’ve been nominated to participate in the 10-day “Mom of an Athlete” photography challenge on Facebook. To play along, I’m supposed to share an image of what it’s like to be a sports mom or a moment in my child’s sports life, without any explanation.

I occasionally do play along with these photography challenges and while I do fit the bill as a Mom of an Athlete more accurately I’d be called the Reluctant Mom of Athletes.

As a person who doesn’t follow televised sports nor play sports, I have surprised myself with how tense or excited I can feel on the sidelines watching my children play. (I’m telling you, this year's soccer playoff game was a serious nail biter!) But at the same time, I find a lot of the youth sports culture can be a little over-the-top.

Let me tell you a little story that sums things up . . . picture it: Mothers’ Day 2019. It’s pouring. The boys have a travel soccer game at a field about 45 minutes away. As Reluctant Mom of Athletes, I normally opt out of rainy or particularly cold games. However, for this game, being Mothers’ Day and all, one of the other Moms had organized a sideline brunch and I had signed up to bring some of the food (sucker).

That morning it was so rainy, so dark and gloomy and windy, I kept saying to my husband, “They’re going to cancel, right?” And he kept bursting my damn bubble by saying, “It’s a turf field, Gi, they’re not canceling.”

So we got in the car, got stuck in traffic (there was some sort of overturned produce truck incident) and arrived late only to find the other Moms huddled under the pop-up canopy that they were struggling to keep from blowing away while our children got soaked to the bone on the turf field.

I had never so strongly questioned our commitment to sports as I did in that moment. I placed my food on the damp table and was greeted with, “Happy Mothers’ Day!” As the wind blew a pile of paper plates off the table, I said, “This is the dumbest thing I’ve ever done . . . and I’ve done a lot of dumb shit in my life.”

I then grabbed a Mimosa and sat in the car.

Thus . . . Reluctant Mom of Athletes photography challenge. No explanations, just pictures:

1. 

2. 

3. 

4. 

5.