So, we decided to sign up our 6 year old daughter for t-ball. Another kid from her class signed up too, so I figured it would be a good way to bond with her classmate. And she’s keen to do it, so why not?
Well, we got our welcome email from the coach saying to meet at his house at a certain time for a parents’ meeting. His work URL was at the bottom of the message, so I followed the link only to find that he and I did our Ph.D.s at the same university across the country, in the same (tiny) department, with the same dissertation adviser at the same time. GET OUT! He was a few years ahead of me, so we never took classes together. Anyway, small world don’t you think? And we currently live on the same street several blocks from each other. NO WAY! So, I email him with this news thinking how cool this whole situation was. To my surprise, he emailed me back with a quick line about how interesting it all was and don’t forget the meeting. Well, OK.
So, I get to the meeting and he has no recollection of the email until I remind him. And, still couldn’t care less. He wan’t mean or anything, just uninterested. I, in the mean time, had remembered that I attended his dissertation defense (anyone was allowed to watch) and learned a key lesson in what not to do (do not tell the committee during the defense that you could have written a whole chapter on something but decided not to–because they will make you write a whole chapter on that thing before they pass you. Needless to say, I didn’t tell him this.)
Anyway, other than all of this, the meeting was odd. First, the co-coach (another guy) starts the meeting by saying that his wife is a pre-school teacher and has determined that children don’t do well when their parents are around. Therefore, they don’t want parents sticking around for practice or for games. On the other hand, the first coach didn’t really want to coach in the first place, but is doing it because he felt obligated, so they actually do need two parents to be there each time to watch the kids on the sidelines. But, he doesn’t have time to do any work on this, so he has no idea how we are going to organize this unless the parents do it amongst themselves.
The problem is, less than half of the parents were able to come to the meeting so he doesn’t want to make any decisions now. Also, he is not going to be there for half of the games because of work, so he needs a parent to sub for him as coach. At this point I asked if the other coach was going to be there as a coach and he said yes. But this guy seems not to be doing anything and the parents are being told to organize themselves. And then we got another earful about how parents can’t just bail on their kids and not stay and help. But, then again, they don’t want to the parents sticking around, either. Now I’m confused. On TV and in the movies (my only frame of reference for t-ball type activities) the parents are cheerfully watching from the sidelines, talking to each other and cheering on their kids. I am totally suprised by the message that parents shouldn’t be there.
Anyway, it was then reiterated that he didn’t want to send any emails, so how are we going to figure out snacks? One of the parents offered to organize snacks and another parent suggested that all the kids bring their own water. Thank god. I was thinking that they could even bring their own snacks at that. Sheesh.
All the while I’m thinking, A) don’t coach if you don’t want to; B) someone has to take some leadership and it makes sense for the coaches to do this; C) email is not that hard.
I just thought we would sign our daughter up, bring her to and stay for the 1 hr practice, cheer her on for the games, have good times, and get a t-shirt. I realize now why players and coaches of professional sports get the big bucks. Things are way more complicated than they seem.
