This Fall's Sadness

This is the first fall in about 12 that we don't have a soccer season.

The local soccer club has been going downhill, and this year, they were unable to put together teams for either of my kids. Number One isn't a surprise. She was lucky to have a fantastic coach from 5th to 11th grade who held together a team when there were very few in her age group throughout the league. But last year there was only one senior on her team, and some of the players were 8th graders. The writing was on the wall.

But Number Two is more frustrated. At her age level, her sister's team won their division. Number Two got dropped without any effort from the club, though one of the parents tried to get enough players for a second team. From the time she was 8 years old, the focus was always on fielding superstars, and a bunch of good players who love to play got left in the cold.

Number Two will play for school in the spring, but Number One is done, and that makes us all sad.

There are some perks, though. No more practices for us to drive to and from four times a week (they almost never had practice at the same time!). No more getting up at 5:00 a.m. on a Saturday to drive an hour and a half for an 8:30 game. (Seriously, who writes these schedules? We'd have 1:00 games five minutes away.) No more yelling at the fellow parents not to give away football scores during Sunday soccer games, because we were watching on tape delay. I get to attend all my local writer's group meetings. We won't have to sit in blistering heat and insanely freezing cold. And we'll have lots more time for things like yardwork!

Wait, did I say perks? Let's try that again.

We'll have lots more time for things like writing. Yeah, that's better.

It's all part of growing up, I guess. What's something you've had to give up recently? What are the pros and cons?