Cauldron is over.
I just slept about 5 hours...a very long, very necessary nap (after my last couple days). As I lay on my hotel bed, typing this, I am sipping water and listening to the Mariners game on my phone ("Seattle Sports" app, for folks who are curious how to hear an M's game in Europe). Trying to relax and unwind the last few days, trying to compose my thoughts.
I am in an odd head space at the moment...not surprising given all the physical and mental stresses my body has been through lately. I have all sorts of "feels." Attending Cauldron for the second time was, for the most part, everything I could have imagined and hoped for. Leaving Cauldron, on the other hand, was bittersweet...not because I wasn't ready to go home, but because I wasn't ready to leave my friends.
No, not just friends. My tribe...my people.
I will talk about that in a later post (which I'll probably start directly after posting this...unless I decide to go back to sleep). But right now, I'm thinking about my other people: my family. My wife and my children. Waiting to get back to them is the hardest thing at this point; I want to be with them right now. Not because I am sad and need to be comforted or anything, but because I am ready for their warm embrace which I haven't felt in days...because I am ready to be back with them, in the "stuff" that are the ups and downs of our life; our highs and lows, the things we share as we live through the day-to-day.
Cauldron is much like that but on a "virtual" or imagined level. Save that thought for the moment, though...file it away.
My wife...I'm not worried about my wife. I know she's been as busy and taxed the last few days as anything...juggling the kids without my help...but she is an extremely tough and resourceful. Like me, she'll be just fine after a couple days of me being home and providing foot massages. The kids on the other hand...
Today was out playoff (soccer) game. It took place at 00:45am, Frankfurt time. It should have ended by 2am. I do not know the result...I am afraid to know the result. I did not want to open my phone because I didn't want to see the text alerts that might pop up...mercifully, there didn't seem to be any (yet). This could mean all sorts of things. Again, I'm trying not to think of it...I'm afraid to think about it. To imagine the possibilities.
Some people reading that might find that odd...that I have bigger fish to fry than the results of a 6th grader's soccer game. Especially a 6th grader who will STILL be playing soccer after this season ends (she is, after all, still playing for her club team and their season goes till March), and who will instead be turning her attention to the starting basketball season and the other activities she pursues.
It's just a game, right? It's not curing cancer or anything.
No, it is everything. My time with my children is precious. Every minute they get older, I feel this more. Every shared moment, every shared victory (or defeat) or activity is special. Every hug and every snuggle from my children is golden.
Coaching my children has been the delight of my life. That my son is now 14 and in high school and I will never coach a team of his again is an immense, melancholy feeling for me. Not just because we had such wonderful successes and such exciting, fun times, but because they were opportunities for us to do something together...do something that at the time was immensely important in the moment. And now, I have only one child left to coach...at most, five more seasons (assuming I coach her volleyball team) once this soccer season ends. And so, I don't want it to end...certainly not before I get home.
And I certainly don't want it to end in a loss and a defeat with me not there. With me, not on the sidelines. With me, not with the team. Diego is coaching the team without me (which has ALSO been a delight) and for him to have to go through a loss, on his own, have to do the coach's job of comforting a team just bounced from the playoffs, on his own, and knowing how he is, how hard he will take it, how hard THEY will take it...and not being there for them, not being there with them...
It's heartbreaking to contemplate.
I've been through it before, multiple times with Diego's teams (I've never coached a team that didn't reach the playoffs)...I know how it is, I know the drill, I know how to "spin" things so the players understand the positives and the pride they need to have and integrate the experience into their psyches as something both meaningful and positive, even if its both sad and hard. But this is Sofia's first time. And Diego's first time in a position of responsibility (being a coach...even an assistant coach...carries a lot more weight on the shoulders than just being a team captain). I wish I was there. I do...I really do.
Mariners are down 4-0 in the game, which is not doing anything to lift my mood. I hate having to wait...patience is not and has never been my forte. I am stubborn as hell (my wife says I'm the stubbornest man she's ever known and, knowing her father, that's a hell of a statement)...but sticking things out because of stubbornness, is NOT the same thing as being able to wait patiently. But I have no other option. What I really want is a damn meal: there were few restaurants open for dinner in Frankfurt on a Sunday evening, and I didn't want Indian or Chinese food. I ended up grabbing a sandwich from a little place with the amusing name of "Hello, Jerry;" it was actually quite delicious, but I'd still have preferred a sit-down meal with some steamed vegetables. Just thinking about another 13 hour plane ride (and the airplane "food") is enough to make me shudder.
*sigh*
All right, that's enough for this post. It's 3:18am (6:18pm in Seattle...time for dinner!). Despite the brief thought of trying to keep my brain/body on "Seattle time," that would mean laying down to sleep no later than 9/10am...and checkout time is noon. Eh. This is the price you pay for the magical ability of crossing half the globe in a day. We live in amazing times.
[you see how I'm trying to change the subject in my own mind? I'm still not checking my phone]
Logan Gilbert gets out of the 4th inning, and the M's have five left to get back in this game. Still have about half a liter of water left...though despite the hydration, I am woefully dry. Maybe I'll take another shower...but, then, I'd have to take off my Cal Raleigh t-shirt. Decisions, decisions.
This is how it is when you're alone and awake on the far side of the world from your home.
Uh, oh. My phone just rang with a notification from Diego (3:24am).
Should I read it? Should I? Face my fear? Isn't that what being "brave" is? Not letting your fear stop you? That's what I'm always telling my kids after all. Am I a "brave" man?
*sigh*
[drink of water]
Okay, I looked. The notification was an auto-notification: Diego asking permission to download the Major League Baseball app for his phone. Jesus H. So, no word on the soccer game results. I could check the league web site, but I want them to give me the news, one way or the other. Perhaps they think I'm still sleeping.
If only.
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