Follow Me, I Don't Know Where I'm Going

Oh my goodness, the rain. Maybe the grass and trees and lakes and streams will benefit from it, but seriously, this is truly unpleasant. It’s September 2016 in Minnesota and it’s wet and it’s cold and it, quite simply, is a horrendous day for a soccer game. I love my kids and all, but I will not sit in a chintzy lawn chair in sideways rain in my work clothes with a cheap umbrella that will not cooperate with the wind to watch them, along with my 12-year-old-at-heart husband and another similarly aged coach, run up and down the field in a scrimmage that simply does not matter. I’ll sit in the parking lot in my warm truck watching through a wet windshield, thank you very much. The other team had the right idea when they decided it was too wet to play and headed home. I admire the commitment and free-spiritedness of these kiddos and coaches who decided an intra team scrimmage was the best way to deal with the rain, but I’ll show my support from dry sidelines.

I love this soccer team. It’s a sweet little team from a sweet little Lutheran school made up of sweet little 4th through 8th graders, both boys and girls this year, who are coached by two sweet and quirky dads who love this sweet little team also. It just so happens that two of the players on this team are my oldest son, 13-year-old Sam, and his younger sister, my 11-year-old Sidney, and the sweet and quirky assistant coach is their dad, my husband, 45-year-old Tim. Our youngest son, 7-year-old Grady, and me, Nicki, young and hip mom and wife whose age shall remain unimportant (I’m 41 if you just must know), are the ones smartly planted in our family-movin’ SUV. My Sidney, one of just four girls brave enough to join the co-ed team (co-ed just this year as they had a player shortage on the typically all-boys team) is holding her own as a scrappy little blonde ponytailed defender out there against pubescent boys and her annoying dad who thinks it’s fun to play her extra hard because he can. This opportunity doesn’t happen everyday, that a brother and sister, two years and a gender apart, get to play on the same competitive team coached by their dad. Although I’m not enthused enough today to be sitting out in the chilly fall rain, I think this is pretty cool. It’s just not likely they will have the opportunity to be part of the same team again.

Thirty minutes of sloppy and fun-filled play ends and even this tough team and its coaches decide enough is enough. Dripping wet and smiling from ear to ear, the players run off the field and pile into family vehicles to head home for a hot shower and something warm to eat. My Sam and Sidney carelessly climb into my truck not minding that it and we are dry and clean and they are managing to spread their cold mess everywhere. After complaints from Grady and annoyed instructions from me, we settle in for the drive home. Tim, my handsome and fit husband of almost fifteen years, jogs up to my window, leans in for a quick kiss that makes me giggle and push his wet and sweaty self away. Little Grady, Tim’s shadow, opts to ride with Daddy and they run off together toward Tim’s pick-up, sprinting as though they can keep from getting soaked even though Tim is already drenched.

Tim swings around the parking lot as I back out. We decide to grab some fast food before making the thirty minute drive out to our dreamy country home surrounded by rolling corn fields, friendly farmer neighbors, peace and quiet, and only one pizza place that is willing to deliver way out there. I’ll follow Tim as, despite living in this area for over thirteen years, I have no sense of direction. Before he rolls up his window he calls out to me, “Follow me. I don’t know where I’m going.” Odd. Tim always knows where he’s going. Except today, I guess.

Those are the last words my Timmy will ever speak to me.