Tonight I ventured into unknown territory for my girls. Thing 1 and Thing 2 went tailgating with me to the LHS and RHS game. Last time I attempted to take a child to a football game (have I mentioned how much I love football?) was when Thing 1 was only three. That's how WELL it went. But today, I felt a new little skip in my step and decided it was beautiful weather and it was time to try it again.
The tailgating went great, simply because they played with friends and could run around. It would have gone better had I brought wine with me, but figured since I'm probably going to know many in the crowd as students, both former and current, I shouldn't be smelling of the grapes. Once we went in the game, Thing 2 immediately turned to whining. I mean immediately. My butt hadn't even made it's marks in the blanket on the bleachers and I could hear the extremely whiny voice saying, "I want to go home." Suddenly, current students swooped in and took her away with them to who knows where, although they brought her back with cotton candy hanging out of her mouth so I guess she was happy, they were happy and ultimately I was happy.
That left Thing 1 with her dear old mom. She was given the opportunity to go various times but kept choosing to stay by me. The kid hates football. I love it. She doesn't understand it. I do. She didn't eat supper because one time she had an awful experience with a hotdog and heat exhaustion so she simply won't touch them so on top of it all, she was starving. I could sense it but more importantly, I was so proud of the way she was trying to appease her mom's interest when really she probably would rather be scrubbing the toilets out (which she abhors). An ice cream cone became her reward as I knew she was hungry. Still not the best part. The best part came when I asked, "Do you want to leave at half time or would you like to watch the band? They're pretty much the best in the city." Thing 1 said, "I want to watch the band, even if it's a long time from now." Music, literally, to my ears.
Marching band, heck any band, gave me such fond memories. Music brings something into ones life that is indescribably important and it has the ability to reach spots in people that nothing else in this world can. I so hope that my love of music can be shared by one of my Things. I do believe I even had a tear in my eye as she watched the whole show with big eyes, loving it.
As we got in the car to leave, Thing 2 was screaming, of course, and Thing 1 said, "Mom, thanks for the cone and thanks for letting me see the band. It was my second favorite thing next to being able to sit with you all night." Sniff. I love that kid.
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