Confessions of a Real Soccer Mom

I was a stay at home mom during my marriage. In those days, Rosanne Barr was still doing standup comedy extolling the virtues of being a "domestic goddess". SAHM wasn't in the dictionary yet -and definitely not on Wikipedia. My life's goal at that time was to get the word "housewife" removed from the English language.

"I didn't marry a house!"

When my daughter started school, and later my son, I became involved in everything they wanted to do. My daughter was the oldest and it started with Brownie Girl Scouts. I was in Girl Scouts through Cadettes, and was more than willing to jump in and be the Brownie leader. That first year culminated in a slumber party in my home with 28 little girls.

A note to anyone who cares: do NOT plan pancakes for breakfast when feeding 28 first- and second-grade girls.

My daughter brought home the flyer for Odyssey of the Mind. That seemed like a great idea and I became the Odyssey of the Mind coach.

In the spring, the YMCA sent flyers through the school announcing their spring soccer program. My daughter wanted to play. I contacted the YMCA to sign her up and was told "Well, there's a slight problem. We don't have a coach for that team. We have plenty of kids that want to play but no one wants to be the coach."

I knew almost nothing about soccer. It was something the Pele played and no one was allowed to touch the ball with their hands.

Before I knew what words were coming out of my mouth, I asked "What does the coach have to do?"

After I was assured that I could pick up the coaching manual that day, I found myself agreeing to be the coach.

I will say that my husband eventually joined in as the assistant coach. We continued for three seasons.

Several years later, I attended a Columbus Crew soccer game. Funny, it looked a lot different on that field than it did when my daughter played.