It happens nearly every night of the week. After dinner has been eaten, baths have been taken, and bedtimes prayers have been said, I’ll hear those soft 5 year-old footsteps as they tiptoe down the stairs. Then a hushed voice will say those magical words: “Daddy, are there any games on tonight?”
Molly picked the right time to become a Celtics fan.
That would be my Molly, and she knows what she’s doing. Like most kids her age she’s become a master at the fine art of parental manipulation. In her mind bedtime remains a cruel form of punishment, an arbitrary weapon wielded by parents who enjoy tormenting their children. She’s committed to finding any way she can to avoid such a fate. Now, Molly isn’t a rookie like her younger sister Abby. She knows better than to try sneaking into the playroom or closing her bedroom door and turning the light on. Molly is no stranger to these attempts, and she knows that parents are masters at sniffing out this activity. So instead she’s adopted a new strategy : weasel her way into things she knows I like to do.
I must admit, I like her style. Notice how she avoids going directly for the jugular. The response would be so easy if she asked “Daddy, can I stay up and watch sports with you?” on a school night, and she knows this. Instead she corners me with a question she already knows the answer to. Let’s face it- can you name a night during the week when there aren’t any sporting events on TV? One might run up against such a night during baseball season, but the winter schedule is crammed with enough basketball, hockey, and football to keep us sports-loving dads entertained. I can’t lie to her, right??
And so, inevitably, Molly will end up next to me on the couch to watch a bit of that evening’s game. She didn’t ask to, and I didn’t say she could, so it works out perfectly. We follow the action in our own ways. I watch Kevin Garnett’s stride to see if his knee is bothering him; Molly watches Doc Rivers’ face to determine if he’s ‘happy’ or ‘angry’, and wildly speculates on the cause of either emotion. I monitor the out-of-town scoreboard to see how the Cavs, Magic & Hawks are doing; Molly monitors the commercials for sightings of “that funny lizard guy”. I shout out an occasional “c’mon guys, time to play some defense!”; Molly makes her own “Go Celtics!” signs and waves them around as if she’s at the game. It varies from sport to sport, but this is generally the way things go. If the night is short on Boston teams, then Molly will ask “which team are we rooting for, Daddy?” and make signs to support our temporary fan status. She’s a master bandwagon jumper already at the age of 5, but generally we try to stick with rooting for the underdogs since they’re not expected to win… oh, and Molly likes that ‘dogs’ is part of the word.
Is this all part of a master plan to turn my daughter into a sports nut? Not really. The truth is that I enjoy the bonding time as much as she enjoys doing something other than going straight to bed. Between her school and my work, I simply don’t get to see her all that much during the day. The time we spend together is precious, so why not steal a few extra minutes when we can? And if she learns a bit about the fine art of pick and roll defense in the process, so be it!
