Soccer season is in full swing.  I didn’t think my daughter would go for it again this year, but she surprised us.  Last year, she was just kind of…vanilla about the whole experience.  She didn’t hate it but she didn’t love it either.  My husband and I were just glad she didn’t ask to quit mid-season.  Color us surprised when she wanted to play again this year.

So here we find ourselves, my husband and I, on Monday and Wednesday nights and every Saturday morning: Sitting on the sidelines watching our daughter on the field.  We both lead busy lives.  Most of the time, we’re running in opposite directions.  But soccer has brought us closer.  We’re fortunate that we only have one child so we don’t have to split our time running tons of kids around.  Just our one and only.  It would be easy for one of us to bail while the other stays for the duration.  But we seem to have made a commitment to each other.  We call it our Soccer Dates.

We drag a couple of lawn chairs, some sweatshirts and sometimes a blanket and sit and talk to each other.  Neither one of us is on our phones.  We talk about our day and what we have coming up.  We vent about things in our life that are driving us nuts.  We talk about the future.  We laugh. We spend a good hour and a half connecting.  Oh and we watch our daughter play some so-bad-it’s-good soccer too.

I can’t tell you when the last time we actually got a sitter and went on a “real” date was.  There’s so much to do at home and too many excuses that get in the way.  But one thing is for sure: I treasure our Soccer Dates.  Until we get it together a little better, these dates on the sidelines are just what we needed.