We are Cobra Kai...

I am so happy the weekend is over. For those of you who find that statement confusing, you obviously are not involved in the oh-so-exciting life of youth soccer. We had NINE, count 'em, NINE soccer games this weekend and I am exhausted.

On Saturday, my ten year old daughter had a travel tournament that was held about 30 minutes away from our home. Her first game was at 10 AM and the last game ended at 4:45 PM for a total of four games. Her team actually went undefeated and won the tournament and my daughter scored close to half of the goals over all four games. I am extremely proud of her, but not for the reasons a lot of parents would have. I am proud of the way she played as a TEAM member. This is a new travel team for my daughter and this was the first time she had played with this group of girls. SD (SuperDiva) is an awesome little athelete and she very easily could have taken over the team and just scored all of the goals. She did not do that. Instead, she helped show the other players on the team how to be better players and helped them score goals as well. SD took the lead and there were numerous times when she had obvious straight shots on the goalie, but she chose instead to pass the ball off to other girls to help them get goals. She had 8 goals over the four games that day, but more importantly, she had at least that many assists that resulted in the other player getting a goal. Not too many adults think this way, much less a child and I am so very proud of her for being such a great little girl (obviously raised well, no?).

On Sunday we had to drive 2 hours to Toledo, Ohio for another tournament; this time for SD's premier soccer team. They won this tournament as well and all of the girls did a wonderful job. The parents.... I am not too sure about. Don't get me wrong, I love the parents on SD's premier team. A lot of us have known each other since they started playing league soccer five years ago and we have added the rest of the parents over the last five years. We get along extremely well and all like to have a good time together. That said, there are always a few people who can't seem to get along and this group is no exception. We have recently added another group of ten year old girls (B Team) and there were some "rostering" issues at yesterday's tournament. The head of our premier group (THE MOST WONDERFUL PERSON AND COACH EVER!!!) asked a few of the girls if they would mind playing down to help the B Team out and they said they would do it. Now Coach had already told ALL of the girls (A and B Team) that if the A team won the tournament, he would pay extra to get trophies for everyone. He did this because we could have easily brought one powerhouse team to win the thing, but Coach wanted all of the girls to get playing time and have the experience.

That said some of the parents were PISSED OFF that their daughters were playing down and made a HUGE deal about it. I couldn't believe these people. You would think that this was the end of their (10 years old, remember) daughter's soccer career. The kids had no problem, but some of the parents even threatened to leave the team - whatever. I offered to have SD play down, but Coach said no. Coach said that these girls had already offered to do this and he would take care of the parents. I think everyone realized that something that shouldn't have even been an issue was totally blown out of proportion into a Peyton Place scale drama. Our A team went on to win all 4 games and we had to book it out of there so we could make game #9.

Game #9 = going to hell in a handbasket

Enter Cobra Kai AKA the Bile Gizzards

Our last game of the day was a makeup game for one of our indoor premier sessions. We had to beat this team in order to win the session (the girls like winning the t-shirts and spaghetti dinners). The team we were playing (the Bile Gizzards) had no hope of winning the session, but they stood in our way of being in first place. NO BIG FUCKING DEAL!! We could have cared less about winning this thing as all of the girls were tired after playing 4 40 minute games in 5 hours and rushing 2 hours home to come straight to another game. Plus SD had played the 4 games the day before. They were tired, it showed and the Bile Gizzards jumped to a 3 point lead. Then the girls decided that they did want to win and came back to tie the game. Once this happened the Lizard's true colors showed. Someone had obviously trained these girls to play dirty and they knew how to get away with it. They were fucking vicious. I cannot believe the dirty underhanded things they were doing to our girls. They did all this shit when the ref wasn't looking and got away with all of it.

There was one little girl who was extremely horrible - we'll call her Johnny Lawrence. She was seen kicking, tripping, shoving and hitting girls. She also knocked one of our girls into the wall and then pretended like SHE had a bloody nose in order to get away with it. I hate to say this about a child but the kid was a little bitch. And whoever taught her to play dirty is an even bigger bitch - CUNT even. None of the bullshit mattered because our girls got the ultimate revenge - they came back to win the game by two goals. The Bile Gizzards were Cobra Kai to the end though, because when it came time to do the high five line, Johnny hit one of our girls so hard she went down. That is when COACH (greatest ever -I keep repeating this) called the kid out as having poor sportsmanship and proceeded to tell the Lizard's coach that his team played dirty and the kids were bad losers - Johnny especially.

I felt bad for the kids on the team who were obviously upset by what happened and were openly crying, but the blame is on the coach and parents who support that kind of fucked up behavior. If these kids are acting like this at 10, can you imagine what they will be like when they start high school sports. No one will want to play with a dirty player and the coaches won't want them on the team and the parents will be shocked, but they shouldn't be. Raise your kid to do the right thing and in the long run it will come back to them. Karma's a bitch and I don't need to do or say anything because in the end, people who raise their kids to act like little bastards are going to be scratching their heads when the same kids become felons and heroin addicts.

I try to teach my children to respect other people and treat them the same way they themselves would like to be treated (I love the Golden Rule lesson). This advice doesn't always show through, but at least I am trying to do my best to raise my children to be good productive people. I cannot say the same for others, but I don't worry about those people. I can only do my best with my family and hope others do the same.

I will end this post with a little food for thought:

Children Learn What They Live - Dorothy Law Neite
If a child lives with criticism, he learns to condemn.
If a child lives with hostility, he learns to fight.
If a child lives with ridicule, he learns to be shy.
If a child learns to feel shame, he learns to feel guilty.
If a child lives with tolerance, he learns to be patient.
If a child lives with encouragement he learns confidence
If a child lives with praise, he learns to appreciate.
If a child lives with fairness, he learns justice.
If a child lives with security, he learns to have faith.
If a child lives with approval, he learns to like himself.
If a child lives with acceptance and friendship, he learns to find love in the world.