Soccer Mom Leaves the Game

At the end of the 2008 soccer season, I turned in my proverbial soccer cleats. Don't worry, I wasn't red-carded; quite the opposite, in fact.

Those who've ever played soccer in Pleasanton, or whose kids have ever played, know that "red carding" - which usually follows the "yellow card" warning – marks the point at which a player is expelled from a game for poor sportsmanship or fouls.

My problem was that I may have not displayed enough obsession for the game.

I've never been successful when it comes to following the pack, participating in the most popular activity, or pushing my kids to be competitive. If the kids are passionate enough to be competitive on their own, I'm OK with that.

But when all three of my kids showed interest in soccer several years ago, I gave in to their excitement. Surprisingly, I enjoyed myself for many years. The only trouble was that, after a few seasons, the kids' passion didn't extend too far beyond the social-fun factor. When their passion waned, so did Mom's.

For that reason, we left the game before last year's season.

As much as I admire the top-notch soccer abilities of kids in this town and their parents' fervor for the sport, our family couldn't fit into the mold.

We  put in our share of time on the field. Over the course of 11 combined soccer seasons with our kids, we met many lovely families, made some lasting friendships, marched in a few soccer parades, learned some skills and witnessed some hilarious sideline antics and cheering sections.

We'll always cherish our memories of our friend, Jeff Cravens, for instance, as he enthusiastically cheered on our twins on the Rage team he coached a couple of years ago. His daughter, Alex, 10, is a talented, athletic girl who now plays at the competitive level.

One year, I signed up to be team mom for my son's team. The only volunteer job more stupid for me to take on would have been coaching; have you ever seen a giraffe play soccer?

After collecting money from families for purchase of jersey lettering, trophies, team banner-making, costumes for the parade, and coaches' gifts, I deposited the cash (about than $241) in my own checking account to make purchases easier.

At the time, I decided it would be safer and simpler to keep the money in one place, rather than having to open a separate account or let the cash sit around in an envelope.

Bad decision. Instead of easing the transaction process, I fretted daily over my "total" and "actual" balances and worried that I'd inadvertently find myself in the kind of mess that landed a group of San Ramon PTA members in court that year.

Pleasanton Soccer Mom arrested for embezzling nearly $250 of recreational soccer team donations to cover family's toilet paper expense fund, the headline would read. Trial to include witnesses who saw the woman making weekly, $241 purchases at Safeway.

After two years of recreational play, my son moved up to a competitive level with matches and tournaments across the Bay Area. While the games were exciting, the entire Sullivan family didn't spend much weekend time together from August through November for three years.

In his second and third years of competitive play, my son decided joined the Dublin league. His former team, the Eagles, to this day is coached by the energetic and talented Johnny Taboada, a resident of Pleasanton whose son, Marcel, plays on the Eagles along with several other Pleasanton boys.

Fortunately, Pleasanton is a city with endless opportunities for kids to find thier passion: Last year my son tried a fall swimming program and Sunday afternoon baseball. One of my daughters took two dance classes and the other began horseback riding lessons, which she continued for six months and plans to resume this winter.

Perhaps one day we'll revive the drive for soccer.

But, for now, we're enjoying a relatively unscheduled autumn. In spite of the dance classes, the weekly faith formation classes, the scout troop meetings, Sunday afternoon baseball and softball, weekly music lessons and - of course - homework, we're enjoying much more family time than in past years.

With our Saturdays wide open and plenty of friends playing soccer, we also know we can find sideline seats to some great field action -- for free.

Cameron Sullivan is the author of the blog, Candid Cameron.