That’s Brianna, my granddaughter, pictured on the left. She’s nine. So that her Mom, Amy, wouldn’t have to drag Gaige (six) and Joey (almost three) out past their bedtime, I volunteered to take Brianna to her lacrosse game.
I’ve never been to a lacrosse game. I may have watched bits and pieces of games on TV, but I never gave much thought to the rules.
Before I get too far into the story, I have to say it was cold and rainy at game time. In fact, because of the rain, despite leaving my house at almost 5:00 on the dot, I didn’t get to Amy’s house until about 6:15. By 6:20, I was back on the road with Brianna in the back seat. We didn’t get to the field until 6:45 for her 7:00 game.
It was still raining when we arrived, but not nearly as hard as it had been during my entire trek north. By game-time, it was barely misting. Soon enough, it stopped altogether.
But it was still cold. It was also almost dark, what with all of the lingering clouds and late hour. I only had my point-and-shoot camera with me because of the rain, which is why the quality of these pics is less-than-optimal.
Are you one of those people who think soccer (aka football) rules are confusing? Yes? Well, then you would have felt even more clueless than me.
I mean, I GET soccer. Soccer is not a sport one has to play to understand, but playing helps. Lacrosse, I’m convinced, is a sport one must play to understand. Even if I knew some of the rules, I wouldn’t attempt to explain them here because that would make for one LONG (and boring!) post.
One thing for sure, I can tell Brianna enjoys lacrosse. She seems pretty good at it, too. I think.
After the game, she asked me, “Did I play well?”
“I don’t know,” I told her.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Well, I had no clue what was going on. I don’t know if you were doing what you were supposed to be doing, or playing where you were supposed to be playing, but you looked good when you were carrying the ball,” I explained.
And she carried it quite a few times.
She either caught or scooped the ball up and ran all of the way down the field with the ball cradled in her stick.
It did look pretty good.
Look at the determination and focus on that face.
Even if I didn’t know what was going on, it was cool to watch.
And as I watched I couldn’t help but think not only of Brianna, but about her parents, too.
She’s got great parents.
There’s TJ, who spent a very large portion of his young life on various baseball fields and realizes the importance of sports. And there’s Amy, also athletically inclined, who is totally committed to making sure all of her kids get to take advantage of every opportunity, sporting or otherwise, available to them. Despite the fact — and this is HUGE — that TJ is away now and will be away for another 12+ months on his Army deployment. With three kids, it isn’t easy keeping up with all of that stuff and still maintaining some semblance of normalcy.
Hubby and I give Amy lots of credit for doing what she does and being such a great Mom. We give TJ lots of credit, too. But he doesn’t get mentioned here nearly as much as he should.
The man loves his family. He loves being a Dad. And he’s a very good husband to Amy.
TJ means the world to Amy and the kids. Living without him over the next year is going to be tough on them. But it will be tough on him, too. He’s not the kind of Dad that says, “Oh, man, I have to be a coach again?” He’s the kind that’s at the front of the line during sign-ups/registration saying, “I’ll be the coach.” And, “I’m going away, but I’ll do everything I can until the very last possible second before I deploy if it will help.”
Why am I bringing all that into this Clueless Granny post? There are two reasons.
One… when I was asking Brianna about her coaches on the way to the game last night, she told me all about Coach Willy. Yes, she likes him. Yes, he’s nice. Yes, he seems to know what he’s doing.
She went on to say, “There’s another coach, too. A really good one. But he can’t be here.” After a pause, she continued with, “His name is Coach TJ.”
She didn’t sound sad (she understands the deployment thing), she sounded resigned. And proud. Which brings me to reason number two…
I personally have not always given TJ the credit he deserves. I sing Amy’s praises here regularly. But TJ definitely deserves mention, too. He really is a great Dad. He doesn’t think he’s special, he just thinks he’s doing his job.
TJ, this post is for you. I haven’t said here often enough, you are very special. You are a great Dad.
Hubby and I are both very proud of you, too. We could not have asked for a better father for our grandchildren.
And don’t worry, while you’re off doing your job, protecting our country, Hubby and I are two of many people who have totally got your back.
