Football is over, fall soccer is over, so, it is time to transition to the next sport on the list.
Matthew: The boy has been quite vocal, from almost the end of last year, that he didn’t really want to do basketball again. I have, as I always do, tell him that we don’t need to make these decisions when the start of the next season was 8 months away, we’ll make it then. And, as we got closer to the tryouts, he relented a little bit (with some encouragement from me; hey, you’ve never not been on the ‘A’ team, it is a good sport for you, etc.).
Went to tryouts. They went ok. Almost immediately afterwards Matthew is saying again that “Dad, I really don’t think I want to do basketball.” As shitty as it sounds, we agree that if he doesn’t make the ‘A’ team that he will stop.
And he didn’t….placed on the ‘B’ team with 11 other kids. What genius put 12 kids on one team….how is that going to work?
Matthew and I agree that he’ll take advantage of some of the extra soccer training available in November and December. And since we have a gap in soccer I decided to put together an indoor team for Nov/Dec. And, without basketball, there will be more time (hopefully) for something Matthew loves, but hardly ever gets to do: snowboarding.
Cpher: Being at the middle school this year means that there is an actual school-sponsored team. Practice after school, take the bus for away games….the sweet life! He’ll still do the community organized league, but, that doesn’t start until after this league ends in December.
48 kids show up to try out for the 18 spots on the 7th grade A and B teams. Cpher comes home from the first day of tryouts (they do 3 days!….that’s kind of nice) and says “I have never seen some of these kids at basketball tryouts. Ever.”
(an aside: I think Matthew has a decent shot here for at least the B team next year if he chooses to do the school team)
So, they tryout Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday after school and Friday after school they all report to the gym and pick up an envelope with the results. They aren’t allowed to open the envelope on school grounds. Cpher walks out to the car, opens the envelope, and says “yes!”. “Congratulations, you have made the Chippewa 7th Grade basketball team!”
They provided a list of the 18 kids that made it (they will sort out the A and B teams this week). Every kid on Cpher’s team last year that tried out made it.
Of course, since we are doing basketball we need to reevaluate the shoe situation. And of course, last year’s don’t fit.
(Cpher originally picked out some light blue with orange sole shoes that would have at least had the blue match the blue in the school colors. But they didn’t have that color in his size, so, he went with the teal option above)
Cpher Part Two: This deserves at least a heading of it’s own; I don’t think I’ve typed it out here yet but Cpher is now the 2nd tallest person in the family (about two weeks back he just barely cleared Suzanne and me…now the distance is very noticeable. God help us if he’s in shoes and we’re not!). And he is the second kid to now need a size 13 shoe! Battleships! Just crazy how big these shoes are. At least he can stop wearing my shoes now…they are so tight that they don’t work for him!
