I’m sitting in a hockey rink even as I type this.  LightGirl has just finished part one of her weekly private lesson with HeadCoach at the rink.  She is now skating in a rink full of boys.  Some of them are quite large.  Most of them are very good.  One of them just skated by with his five o’clock shadow glistening at me.  Well … now.  My little girl is skating amongst large young men.  She is looking just the tiniest bit overwhelmed and undone by it all.  She wants to get in their game.  I suspect they’d make room for her.  But she doesn’t know the code yet.

It’s one of the things I’m enjoying most about hockey.  It’s a very egalitarian sport.  There’s very little crying out, “You skate like a girl!”  Yes, the boys do play harder and more aggressively than the girls.  But the girls are simply feted for playing.  They are embraced for being out on the ice and welcomed.  Hockey is such a tiny little sport that everyone who plays is looked on as a compatriot because of the love of the game.  The boys don’t appear to be threatened by the girls.  Instead they join them on the ice.  I guess they figure, the more  the better.

Hmmm … I wonder when the church will get that mentality.

Today was supposed to be a quiet day. We didn’t have any plans. Well … a LightGirl had a hockey game in the afternoon. But that was really it.

Then a friend called. He made arrangements for LightBoy to fulfill a dream. And off went LightHusband and LightBoy to learn how to handle firearms. I cringed. It is counter-intuitive. But I think weapons are too serious to ignore. He passed the safety test with flying colors. Then he scored really well in his marksmanship as well. He floated home. And used many words to tell me about his adventures. He also brought treasure with him … shell casings to be sorted and categorized. Many, many, many times over.

I was home with FlamingEwe baking cookies for a cookie exchange and making decorations for our guild holiday extravaganza. LightHusband and Boy arrived home in time for lunch. Then he was off again with LightGirl and a couple of the BlazingLambs for the hockey game, while the cook baking and Christmas crafting continued apace.

Then the phone rang and one proud papa’s voice rang out, “She scored her first GOAL!!!” She scooped the puck out of the back corner, carried it around to the net and dropped it in around behind the goalie’s back.

Here she is, rejoicing in the moment with her team mates!!

That’s my girl!!

Both LightChildren floated off to bed, 3 feet off the ground, this evening. It was a good day of firsts. It was a little bittersweet for this mom. After all the other firsts I witnessed, these firsts they accomplished with others. And that was first in and of itself. This too is another good step.

We’re in Raleigh this weekend.  LightGirl has a couple of hockey games down here.  We spent Friday night with LightHusband’s brother and his family.

The first hockey game was Saturday night.  It was in an old rink that had wooden seats and a low ceiling.  This was simultaneously delightful and disturbing.  The wooden seats were wonderful.  If you’ve ever been to an ice rink and sat on the metal bleachers … well … just imagine how much more comfortable wood might be in an environment devoted to keeping a large sheet of ice frozen.  The low ceiling did two things.  Well … perhaps three.  It made for fantastic lighting for LightHusband’s photography!  It kept the cold air near to the ice.  It kept the cold air near to the spectators.  Ahhh … it’s that last that was discomfiting.

Due to a series of strange events, CoachWonderWoman could not be with her team this weekend.  She is having a much deserved weekend with her husband.  So the girls are being lead by the very capable coach of the U19 team.  I met him briefly before the game last night.  He seems very nice and has the girls’ best interests at heart.  He also seemed to be coaching with the same philosophy that CoachWonderWoman has.  They did well.  But it was obvious that something was awry.  They weren’t quite playing as a team.  They weren’t looking for each other in the manner that they often do.

It struck me as I sat in the stands.  Most of the other teams we face have male coaches.  Their coach is a woman.  They know how to sort out her voice from all the other voices easily.  It comes naturally.  And, they are used to her voice calling to them.  They practice with the U19 team and usually they filter CoachU19’s voice out and Coach WonderWoman’s in.  Their norm is to NOT listen to him.  Not because his advice is bad, wrong or misleading, but because normally it’s not meant for them.  Now, in the heat of a game they were having to re-filter which voice to listen to.

Later on, I thought more about that.  I thought about how that analogy effects all of us.  How do we filter the voices we listen to?  Do we know when to change the filter?  How do we know when to re-filter in the heat of a moment?  What voices are we listening to?  Do they have our best interests at heart?  More importantly (for those of us who believe in God) how do we filter out the loud voices to hear His still small voice?  Do we recognize it when we hear it?  Or have we changed coaches so often we no longer know who or what we’re listening to?

I’ve entered a new phase in my life. This one came as a surprise. Unanticipated. Out of the blue. It all began sometime last winter and I’m still not sure how. But the first omens of it came during the Olympics last winter. LightGirl announced that she wanted to watch the hockey games. As the first game began, she ran to the schoolroom, grabbed the “H” WorldBook Encyclopedia, opened it to “Hockey” and proceeded to watch the game with book open on her lap to the page with the pictures of a referee on it with all of his hand signals. She watched all the games in like manner until she had memorized the ref’s calls and knew what they were before they were announced.

She wanted to take skating lessons. Simple. A neighbor was taking her son who was at the same level. So, off she went to skating lessons. She needed skates. Sometime in the spring she needed a stick for stickhandling lessons. Early in the summer she went to a day camp for hockey skills. Then she needed ….. e quip ment.

This fall we found a team for her to play on. It’s a good team. She loves it. And I’ve become …

… a

hockey mom.

What? How did this happen? One day I was just a mom and now I’m a hockey mom.

I went to a game on Saturday. I sat in the stands with about 4 other moms watching our girls do something we could never do. We weren’t allowed. So it never crossed our minds when we were their age. Most of us never even dreamed of it. We just stomped on those dreams before they even saw the light of day. We don’t speak of that of course. But there’s a light in these women’s eyes and I know I have it too. My girl isn’t going to have her dreams stomped on. She’s going to grow up stronger than I was. She isn’t going to have to be twice as good as a man to be considered half as bad. So I sit in the stands, work on my quilts and cheer these girls about to become women. They are learning how to skate hard. How to fall down and get up while their legs are still moving. How to make mistakes, but learn from them, and to not stop. How to get their heads in a man’s game and keep up.

Maybe, just maybe, all things being equal, things will be equal when she grows up. At the very least, she and her generation may be more prepared for it than their mothers were.

The ubiquitous “they” say that the adolescent years are a time of formation. It is a time when the character is formed, when the child becomes an adult. What “they” don’t tell you is that “they” are speaking of the parents, not the teenagers.

LightGirl is rushing headlong down the road of adolescence. She is giddily lapping up the days. Rejoicing in each moment. At a wedding on Saturday, she was overjoyed to repeat to each waiter time and again that, no she did not want any wine, she was “only 12.” As her mother, I felt faint each time it happened. Yes, she is tall and lovely … but she is ONLY 12 for heaven’s sake. Gawky and stilt-walky in her too-long legs and too-tall shoes. Goofy with her hair that won’t work right yet because she’s still learning. And oh-my-goodness I don’t think I will survive the moment by moment dance recitals. No this is not a dance recital that one views, this is a dance where one must listen to a recital of the moment by moment review of events and then an instant replay of the new moves the dancer has learned. The new moves which appear as frightening spasms out of the context of the dance.

Sunday came yet another new experience. I attended my first hockey game. I found that I am not a good sports parent. When LightGirl first got onto the ice, she had the same look on her face that she used to have during multiplication drills. It was not a look I have any patience for. I found myself wanting to yell advice at her. No, commands. Anything to make that look go away. To get her to skate faster and do better. Not be so gawky. Be perfect during her second ever game. Not that I have high standards or anything … yeesh. I was fortunate to be sitting next to some very chill parents who encouraged me when I grumbled. The coach gave me a good visual and more encouragement for how well LightGirl is doing after the game. Today we discovered (during her private lesson) that the poor girl’s skates are too small and she has been wearing her shin pads incorrectly!! But her mechanics are great. It might be that when her feet don’t hurt and when she is able to bend her knees, she’ll come alive. Perhaps her mother will gain a little patience as well 😉

Perhaps adolescence is time when we’ll both develop a little character.

Today was a day for new things in our family. At our church we joined with the Jewish tradition and celebrated Rosh HaShana. We explored the themes of het (missing the mark), judgement and repentance. Examining the ways that not following the Great Commandments wounds those in our tribe, or sphere of influence. Checking out the manner that lists of sins have become matters of the heart and the ways in which we can be turned towards God or away from him.

Well … that’s what LightBoy and I did.

LightGirl and LightHusband left very early this morning and drove to a city somewhat south of here for her first hockey game ever. The coach plays everybody … every body. An excellent coach, who can find. One who is more concerned about teamwork and relationships than about winning (even tho that is important). LightHusband came home with glowing reports about how wonderful the coach and the game was. LightGirl said, “We lost. But now I know everyone’s names!” It’s those little things that are important.

So here are some pictures of my girl. Looking like official. Wearing number 11. Playing the one game that is sure to tweek my nerves. After all the fights endured by my parents between my brother and I over whether he would watch Hockey Night in Canada, or I would get to watch The Waltons. Surely, I thought, living in a southern city and raising a girl, hockey was not even on my radar. ‘Twas not to be. And I am left with the last laugh.

When I was in highschool I remember that my fondest dream was to never make decisions that I would regret. I was very sure that this was going to be a simple task to accomplish. At the ripe old age of 17 or 18 and even when I was in college and on into my early 20’s the notion that decisions were simple matters of black and white, that the path ahead would be clearly marked seemed obvious to me.

I’ve discovered, of course, that life is full of shades of grey. Black and white are mostly reserved for television programs and movies. Paths are fraught with twists and turns; some of which can be discerned, but most cannot. Choices must be made. Mostly I’ve learned that it’s not the large decisions that affect us the most. Sometimes the small decisions have the largest effect.

Of course, too one must also consider who to grieve the most. Should I grieve myself, or my children, or my husband? Or my calling? How to make decisions in that arena?

I made a decision to follow my heart, but it means missing the chance to see, and support LightGirl play in her first hockey game ever. Now I have to decide, am I actually following my heart? or just my ego?