I grew up playing sports year-round. Starting at age 5, it was soccer in the fall, basketball in the winter, and softball in the spring. When I discovered I could play indoor soccer in the spring as well, my mother put her foot down and told me I had to choose just ONE sport a season and I chose soccer. These were just the official sports - I loved to run and swim and play touch football, dodgeball, frisbee - if it was a sport I was in. Through eighth grade, when most of the other girls had moved from the playgrounds to other parts of the school to chat and gossip at lunch, I could be found on the basketball court with the boys trying my hardest to prove I was good enough.
Yet, middle school was also the time where my hesitancy to speak up began to grow. It wasn't enough to have a desire to play, to love to play sports, I had to be the BEST if I wanted the right to play - as a girl. Even in P.E. when we were put on teams for touch football - when I knew I could throw better than the boy who took on the role as my team's QB and knew I could catch a pass on a run with the best of the boys - I never once spoke up for my chance to try my hand in the leadership position. At that age, I became terrified of making mistakes. A boy could make mistakes in sports, but a girl - she had to be perfect or she shouldn't bother even stepping on the field or court.
I can't pinpoint one conversation or one person or one moment in time when this message was driven into me as a child, yet as an adult I've had it reinforced over and over again in both subtle and blunt ways. Recently I was told in a bar by a Welsh man who was a self-proclaimed "fan of women" that "women shouldn't even be playing football (soccer.)" However, it occurs to me as I picture the soccer field at my son's school during a recent school event - packed end to end with boys - that often it's a mere absence of other girls or women on the court or field that scares girls and women off from participating.
This fear of being the "only" on the field is why it is so important to step up and be willing to be the first girl or woman on the field. By doing so, we give one another permission to play. In my life, I've been both the first girl to step on the field and I've been the woman who needed the reassurance of other women to give me the courage to participate.
One of my most glorious soccer moments came during a staff and student soccer game, thanks to the willingness of another teacher, Beth, to take part in the game, thereby paving the way for me to join as well. If Beth could play, I thought, I can play! And if I could play, well, then the girls' team knew that they had a right to be on the field too. Yes, I was slower than the teenage boys and stepped on a few feet, but I could defend, pass and dribble well enough to keep up.
Then, when our team drew a direct kick near the end of the game, the boys' coach called me over and told me to take it. Except that actually, he just wanted me to act as decoy and fake it, so he could make the kick. I refused, insisting that either I take the kick or I don't. This delighted the high school students and they lined up shoulder to shoulder in the goal, so that there wasn't any way to go low. I took a deep breath and sent the ball into a sweet spot in the left corner of the net above their heads. Everyone on the field went crazy. If Beth hadn't stepped on that field first, I never would have had the guts.
While I haven't had as magical a moment before or since, I try not to let the fear of being the "only" stop me from doing what I love and I've seen the impact of how my participation encourages the participation of others. When I coach my son's team, I am giving permission to other moms to coach their sons' teams. When I play in the parent versus kids games, I am welcoming other moms onto the field. I'm not the best and I never will be, but by showing up, I open doors for others. I try to be someone else's Beth. I hope you will too.
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