Funny How Things Work Out

We had a great time a couple of weekends back at the Dartmouth hockey game, and it serendipitously turned out really nicely without any planning. In fact, it was completely happenstance how things transpired. Now we normally go to the hockey games fairly regularly, it’s a fun night out in the big city and where we can eat Boloco burritos, hot dogs and churros, and even see friends with the same game plan as us, no pun intended. This time around there was a big crowd of people we knew from hockey, and it worked out beautifully.

At first I couldn’t figure out why they were there en masse, all wearing their team jerseys. I thought maybe I’d missed an email or something before I realized it was the older kids who were together. A has some friends on the team, and she went over right away, and a lot of those players have siblings on N’s team, but he was a bit more pensive. I think it was because he didn’t have his jersey he felt a little out of place, but he had his hat on, and that should have been enough.

Either way, he held back a little and sat with us, which is a little heartbreaking because you could tell he wanted to go over and hang with his buddies rather than his stiff and boring parents. We kept encouraging him to go over, but he stood his ground and wouldn’t budge. It was going to take something big to get him to join the party. Well, soon enough, that moment arrived when his buddies came over and told him to come over and sit with them. Without a moments hesitation he was gone. It’s moments like that that remind you what being a parent is all about.

I think the kids had a blast, and it was nice seeing our friends outside of our typical environment, i.e., hockey. Then again, that’s not true, we were at a hockey game. Either way, it was a lot of fun, and it really came out of nowhere.

As a parent, you live for these moments. Until the next time, thanks for reading, and thanks to Phillip Worsnop for the pic.