I’ll be standing on the sidelines, sitting in the bleachers, or waiting in the car after practice, and it suddenly sinks in: I’m standing in the middle of the moments I’ll miss the most.
In just a few short years, this chapter will close, and I am so not ready.
One of mine is already in college, his youth sports and music days have ended, and I’m so proud, but it still tugs at me. One will graduate in May, already half out the door, chasing what’s next. And my youngest is just stepping into high school, dipping her toes into the same world her brothers once dominated, the games, the team dinners, the big wins and the quiet heartbreaks.
As a military spouse, I’ve never had one hometown that raised my kids. No long-term bleacher crew or coffee group that’s been around since preschool. Instead, I’ve had seasons, new schools, new fields, new faces and I’ve learned to build community in fast bursts of belonging.
We’ve never had a home team. We’ve always been the new family, with the new kid who sometimes takes the spot of the hometown favorite. And that’s not easy. It takes resilience, the kind that doesn’t come from winning games, but from showing up over and over again when no one knows your name yet.
Every move has meant starting from scratch: fighting for opportunity, earning a place, proving you belong. It’s meant watching my kids walk onto fields where no one’s cheering for them yet, and holding my breath until they find their rhythm.
But there’s something beautiful in that too. Because with every new start, we’ve learned to weave ourselves into the fabric of each community even if only for a little while. To show up, work hard, and hopefully leave each team, each school, each group a little better for having let us be part of its story.
The things I’ll miss the most aren’t the trophies or the schedules. It’s the recap conversations in the car after a game, when they talk faster than I can keep up. It’s jumping up and down in the bleachers holding homemade posters, live-streaming games so friends and grandparents halfway across the world can watch. It’s sharing photos to Instagram that the players love and repost, knowing I caught a moment they’ll remember too.
As we drove home from a friendly in Richmond this weekend, Carson said,
“That was not my best day.”
I replied, “No, it wasn’t. But did you have fun? You got to play on the field — in the position you worked to perfect for seven years before ending up in goal, right?”
He thought for a second and said, “Yeah, it was fun to stretch my legs.”
And then, just like that, we moved on talking about showcase tournaments, schedules, and how to make it all work over the next four weeks.
These are the conversations I’ll miss. The real measure of growth, not just in the stats or the scores, but in those quiet, honest moments where they reflect, adjust, and learn to respond faster to the pace of life. When they vow to work harder… and then actually do it. Week after week.
Those are the moments that build a life, the small, ordinary pieces that make up something extraordinary.
And maybe that’s what this season is teaching me: how to love the middle. Not just the milestones, but the messy, beautiful in-betweens.
Because this is it, this is home right now.
A car full of stories. A camera full of memories. A heart full of pride.
And when the bleachers finally go quiet, I know I’ll miss the noise most of all.
