B8

Wilfred Langmaid
Days between

Stumble Upon

del.icio.us

Digg

Facebook

Print

Email

Speak Up

And then my line gets cast into these

Enlarge Photo

Here’s how it’s done: Jerome Langmaid, left, gets some pointers from his Fredericton Minor Baseball Rookie Division Royals coach Jonathan Duncan.

Time passages

There's something back here that you left behind

Oh, time passages

Buy me a ticket on the last train home tonight.

- From Time Passages, by Al Stewart

Every time I think I can be horrified no further with reality television, I am proven wrong.

Case in point - one week ago tonight.

Channel surfing brought us to something called I Know My Kid's A Star. It's a reality show in which a group of children, along with their parents, compete in hopes of being judged the next child star.

The fact that Danny Bonaduce is the host tells you all you need to know.

It is a tragic and depressing indictment of the way so many parents live vicariously through their children, pushing their progeny to achieve their own unrealized dreams.

As a parent, I have always told myself I would not do such a thing, and while I have my failings as a dad, I like to think I do not push my kids to do the things that were or are my dreams - not theirs.

So, it was a great treat for me - the sports fanatic who had neither the gift nor the encouragement to follow such pursuits in my youth - to have our eldest son, Jerome, say that he wanted to play baseball this summer. I happily signed him up in Fredericton Minor Baseball.

It has been a wonderful ride for me. Bethany is in her fourth year of softball and Jerome is in his first year of baseball, so that means lots of games - a fine way to spend a summer, from my perspective.

For Jerome, it was all exciting and new. As a member of the Rookie Division Royals, he was on a team with some other first-year players but also with players who had done it before - some for the past four years.

All were in the same age group, though, and all were treated with care, dignity, respect and equality by the wonderful Royals coaches.

Jonathan Duncan and Lee Hoyt gave of their time and talent, and were masterful mentors. Jerome learned so much - the practical skills of the game, but also the love of the sport.

For me, the highlights were many - seeing Jerome's skills come along week by week but also seeing him decide to come and sit beside me to watch some of a Boston Red Sox game and ask neat, specific questions about the chess match that is a baseball game.

However, what made it all work is that I saw nothing of the horror stories that are the caricature of bad parent behaviour at their kids' sports events.

It was all good fun every week. All the boys batted in each of the three or four innings, everyone got to play different positions, and no one kept score.

The boys learned the love of the game and the skills of the game, but they also learned how to treat one another. The coaches took great pains at reinforcing these life lessons - giving them the same degree of import as the need to stretch and warm up before playing.

And the parents - myself included - didn't undo all the good the coaches did. Sure, we all cheered, but we cheered for everybody.

Some of us were surely thinking back to our own youth. However, we all seemed equally aware of how much our kids were loving what was happening and how privileged we were to have coaches that cared so much.

Granted, I was sometimes wishing I had done something like this when I was Jerome's age. However, I was far more tuned into savouring every moment of this time passage.

I'm sure happy and grateful to all involved, and can hardly wait for the crack of the bat to resume for the boys next June.

Long-time Daily Gleaner columnist Wilfred Langmaid is employed by the University of New Brunswick. He resides in Fredericton.