Game Over

Ian quit baseball yesterday. Rob wasn't happy. In fact, when I started to write this post, Rob was simmering with quiet anger. He has now settled into a state of quiet disappointment. I think Rob was almost as upset with me as he was with Ian, since I enabled the quitting.

The way baseball season has worked this year is that Rob talks to Ian the morning of or night before a game, gets him to commit to that particular game, and then leaves it up to me to get him to the ballpark when required. Ian always responds the same way to my attempts to get him out of the house at the given time: "I'm not going." I express my frustration and disappointment in the nicest possible terms. I tell him his father is going to be very upset with him. I ask him why he agreed to go when his dad talked to him about it. And ultimately I resort to, "Call your father. I'm not getting in the middle of this."

Yesterday morning Rob assured me Ian was good to go for last night's game. He told me Ian was allowed to bow out after this game if he personally informed the coaches that this was it for him. I expressed my skepticism about this whole scenario, but prepared to give it the old college try come 5:00 p.m.

At 5:00, I ask Ian to get dressed for the game. "I'm not going." We go through the scenario described above, ending in "call your father," but this time we hit a road bump. We can't reach Rob on the phone. As it gets closer to game time, mom panics. Ian is too big to wrestle to the floor and force into his baseball pants and jersey. And there's no way I'm dragging him to the car and strapping him into his car seat seat belt, kicking and screaming. In some ways, many ways, the toddler years were simpler. At least then you could physically manipulate them as required. The increasing difficulty of parenting this tween is not good news for me because I thought the toddler years were hell. But I digress.

I was stuck with a kid who was already late for pre-game warm-ups and who was expected to play ball in about 20 minutes. I resorted to telling him that not only is his dad going to be pissed angry disappointed with him, but his team is too. Of course, since he believes he's the worst kid on the team and they'd be better off without him, Ian isn't buying this at all. In desperation, I tell him that if he's not going to suit up and play, we've got to go tell the coach, in person. This idea has no appeal to Ian either. "Can't we call or send an email?" Nope. I stand firm. If you're going to be a quitter, you're going to be a quitter with class.

I drive Ian to the ballpark where I ask the coach for a minute of his time. Ian can't bring himself to tell the coach of his decision, so I do the talking. The coach expresses his disappointment, but understands. Ian stands there looking slightly mortified. Game over.