First Day of School

Today was the first day of school. Number One started eighth grade, her last year of middle school, and Number Two started fourth grade. For some reason, it didn't feel as "big" as the first day of school usually does.

Perhaps because both kids were pretty blasé. Perhaps because it was pretty damned hot this morning, and "first day of school" really seems like it should have the bite of fall, despite the fact that fall is nearly a month away.

But mostly, I think it's because of the weekend we just had.

When Number One was 8, she had the option of playing rec soccer or travel. She wanted to keep playing rec. I was glad, because I wasn't ready to dedicate full weekends to soccer. Weekends like this one.

Number One played in a six-game tournament in Gettysburg--three seeding games, one of which they won, and three tournament games, in which they wound up in the consolation bracket, taking sixth. The great part was seeing 15 of her 18 teammates together. It's early, but they're starting to come together. I have high hopes for this season, because usually their season record stinks but they do great in tournaments, at least having a run at the championship. Maybe things will be reversed this year.

Number Two played a three-game tournament in Downingtown. It was quite a wild time. The setup was to play three games in our four-team bracket. The team that won the bracket (based on points for wins, ties, goals scored, and shutouts) would play the team that won the other bracket in our "flight." So we played three really good teams with whom we were fairly evenly matched, winning two and tying the third, and failing to win the bracket by only one point. If it was all points based, we came in third.

But circumstances can sometimes suck. Going into the third game, we were one point behind because the team we played in that game had a shutout and we didn't. If we won outright, we'd go to the final game to play for the championship. We tied the game with them 1-1, a heartbreaking situation because the same girl scored both goals. Yes, every soccer player's nightmare. Of course, the important things were learning and having fun, and they all did that. And everyone was in good spirits when we left.

The other factor that made it wild was that in our first game, we had more injuries than we'd ever had in an entire season before, as far as I can recall. Two of our defenders went down in the first half after being kicked hard in the calf and ankle. Then Number Two, who plays goalie, got three of her fingers bent back badly enough to pull her off the field. She sprained the middle finger (still hurts two days later) and was icing it when not five minutes after she came off the field, our other goalie got kicked in the face and got a bloody nose.

Proud Parent Moment

Coach: "I need a goalie. Who's a team player? Who's gonna go in for me?"

Team: Silence

Number Two: "I'll go back in."

And she did, and she did great.

With all the injuries, I learned two of our parents (one of whom was on site) are doctors. The ER doc/dad who was there joked that he'd hold clinic after the game, but it ended up not being a joke, as he taped up our injured defenders before each game after that. So we're super-lucky. Retired college soccer coach for an assistant coach and our very own trainer!

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So, back to first day of school. We had the expected kinks, though they were worse than usual. The elementary bus was 20 minutes late, which means the kids were 20 minutes late getting to school. No explanation for why it was late. I was blown off when I called the school, given excuses about assigning seats at each stop, but we're the first stop! They have new bus routes and new procedures, though, and it looks like some things are going to have to change, because she was about 20 minutes late getting home, too. And one of the neighbors didn't show up. He wound up on a different bus or something. Scary.

Number One's day went smoothly. One of her teachers makes the kids do pushups for saying certain words or violating rules like not having a hall pass. She didn't have to do any, but finds the whole thing amusing. Her three closest friends are on her academic team for the first time, though she only shares one class each with two of them. They get to eat lunch together, which is nice. They've been close since third grade, even with being torn asunder entering sixth grade and all making new friends. It's always nice to see.

As for me...

I spent the morning cleaning, doing laundry, taking the cat for a nail-clipping, getting groceries, and going to the post office. That meant that 1) it wasn't the easy-going day I was looking for, and 2) it went way, WAY too fast.

But I'm glad we're here.