By Kathleen Guthrie Woods
I am a huge fan of watching kids of all ages participate in just about any kind of sporting or performing event. I don’t care if a player is running toward the wrong goal or if the opposing team scores the most points or if the knight in tin-foil armor has to have his lines whispered to him from the teacher behind the curtain. I applaud and enjoy it all.
Watching my own kids was one of the activities I most looked forward to participating in as a proud parent. Alas…no kids for me. And since it would be weird if I showed up to watch a random game at the park, I put the word out to siblings and friends to let me know when I could come watch their kids.
“Send me the game schedule,” I said to a friend after she complained to me about how much time she spends chauffeuring her boys to practices. “When’s the next match?” I texted to another friend after getting a video clip of her daughter scoring a game-winning point. Despite multiple requests, I rarely got a response. Finally I pinned one friend down. “I’m serious!” I said. “I really really want to go watch your daughter play.” “Really?” she said. “We didn’t send you the schedule because we didn’t want you to feel obligated, we didn’t want to burden you.”
What followed was an open chat about how much I loved watching kids play, how much I missed being able to watch my own kids play, and how I hoped I could ease my feelings of loss by watching her kids at play. She got it. She finally heard me, and a couple of weeks later I had a seat in the bleachers.
It’s not easy or fun putting ourselves out there like this, but if you’ve been sitting on the sidelines too long, I encourage you to persist. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be part of the fun.
Kathleen Guthrie Woods is a Northern California–based freelance writer. She is mostly at peace with her childfree status.
Oh I can relate to this. I sadly live too far from nieces and nephews to support them. I frequently asked my friend to tell me when her daughter was pkaying netball so I could come and watch. She never told me, and then a year or two later I discovered she’d given it up and taken up rowing. Sigh. Likewise, I was keen to watch her son play soccer. Which he often did at a field just down the street from my house. She never did. I gave up and, for many reasons, we’ve drifted apart.
I’m the same way. My husband and I enjoy going to watch kids play and have told our siblings time and again to let us know the schedule. With over 20 nieces and nephews you’d think we’d be everywhere all the time.
Over the years only two parents bother to give us the schedule. So went go to see those children play. This year we decided to not even ask for schedules. My brother came through (as usual) with his kids schedules so I added a few of those games to my schedule.
Then a 7 year old nephew ASKED us to come to his game. You better believe that we emailed his parent and got the details. We went to the game yesterday and he was super excited to see us in the stands. He came over to us between innings to make sure we knew what position we were at and to let us know which of his friends we should be watching. Afterwards he came over to talk to us and I could tell how important it was to him to have fans in the stand. This is a kid that never says boo to anyone. He’s shy but has a passion for baseball. This was a different kid on the field.
We’d love to watch the other kids but we’re tired of always asking. Looking at the situation I can see how we get slighted. Parents are busy. Heck, I’m busy. For some of our siblings it’s a challenge for them to even get themselves to the game. I know none of them are concerned with taking the time to watch other kids in the family. I imagine they likely don’t have time to think about the childless people in life who want to be included. I really do understand this. Now that the kids are getting older we feel okay with waiting for that personal invitation from the actual child. In fact, it makes it much more enjoyable for us to know that our presence is wanted and appreciated.
Going to the games sort of helps me. I don’t particularly care about sports and even though I love watching my loved ones, I’m pretty happy that I don’t have to be the one to attend every game, every time.