Let them have fun
Istretched my back, using both hands to massage my lower spine. Years of sitting on bleachers and pews has made it impossible to spend long periods on hard surfaces. I checked the clock. Eight minutes to go. Noise bounced off cinderblock walls in an echo of cheers and groans.
I was at the Penick Boys and Girls Club watching my 9-year-old daughter prance down a basketball court. She smiled the whole way, grinning at her teammates and competitors. She bumped an opposing player and apologized.
“Why is she being so nice?” My wife whispered.
“Because she’s 9,” I answered. “We’re going to have to teach her that being nice is just fine, but she doesn’t have to apologize every time she bumps into someone in a basketball game.”
She was right. Our daughter was spending a lot of time ensuring she didn’t make anyone feel bad as her team closed the gap against a loaded group of girls. The scoreboard blipped and the numbers changed with a bucket. Our daughter’s team was down only 18-2 now.
We had walked into the club from a cold February night. The front door opened and let fly a series of cheers into the dark sky. We paid our $2, received a sheet of paper, and weaved through a large crowd exiting the gym while another large crowd entered.
The Boys and Girls Club of America traces its history to pre-Civil War days. Arkansas found its membership in 1912 when a group of newspaper carriers formed the Citizenship Club, becoming the Pulaski County Boys Club in 1915. In 1971, girls joined in as well, according to the club’s website.
Central Arkansas’ Boys and Girls Clubs have launched a number of world-class athletes—Derek Fisher comes to mind—but it all started with a simple game in a crowded room on cold winter nights. Each world-class athlete started out having fun.
Asign hung on the wall outside the court where my daughter played: “Remember, these are kids, not professionals.” I opened the sheet I had received at the door; it was a primer on expected parental behavior. In short: be positive.
Our daughter be-bopped in earnest, and most of the other girls did too. The meanness of competition had not yet touched them, and they still thought of sports as fun—not as a scholarship gate, not as potential for professional employment, not as a personal trophy to cling to long after the games ended. They weren’t yet victims of unrealistic expectations.
I read the sheet again, mentally highlighting the necessity of encouraging fans to be positive at a third-grade girls’ basketball game. I briefly wondered where sports was heading with its loyalty-lacking transfer portals, image deals, and misleading carrot of major money just a three-pointer away.
Then, my mind returned to the Boys and Girls Club where I sat.
It seemed the ideal venue for kids to explore physical activities, gain confidence, find passion. And, yes, have fun.