"You're embarrassing me dad," our younger son Myles told me as I
watched his older brother play basketball. "I don't care..." I
retorted, "Get used to it." Was I in for a reckoning?!!
Most parents stress a desire to be proud of their kids, and no place
stresses that more blatantly than in the sports arena. Don't get
me wrong. I tell my sons I'm proud of them when they bring home
good report cards; when they stand up against some kid that tried to
get them to do something they knew was wrong.
I even tell them I'm proud of them when they remember to tell their mom
they enjoyed the meal she cooked for them, or shared the last portion
of their favorite desert with their brother. I tell them I'm
proud when they did the wrong thing for the right reason, as Jeremy did
when he let a friend crash at our home because he was on the ‘outs'
with his dad. But I also have to remember: kids like to be proud
of their parents, and we parents have to sometime alter our behavior to
accommodate their desires.
Our older son is developing in basketball. Each game he gets
better, and has a dream of getting a scholarship. I don't dismiss
that. I would like for him to get a scholarship to help defray some of
the expenses. But I would be just as happy if it was an academic
one. But right now, he eats, sleeps, dreams and swoons
basketball. He's lost immediate interest in girls. He's
focused. That's good. But he can't stand his dad yelling at
games.
He has no idea how proud I am of his recently found genes. My
brother coached several basketball teams. I'm a runner. So
there's no question we got some skills. I was proud to call his
name and cheer on his team. But he and I had to come to
terms. I was embarrassing him. He didn't like it.
Well that hit me in the gut. Didn't he know that was my
right? Didn't he realize all the trips I'd made to his games,
taking him to practice, paying for lessons gave me the right to
yell? Didn't he realize that shutting me up would hurt? I
think he understood all that, and I could tell that he was happy I was
proud of him, but he needed me to shut up. I was interfering with
his game.
Kids don't know how to say some things. That's when the mature
one has to step up and hit the curve being pitched. This is when
the mature one has to overlook his immediate and limited view of things
and see the picture as it really is. This is when a dad realizes
he has to acknowledge the courage it might take to hurt the feelings of
someone you love. So I listened. I didn't talk back; rather
I took a step back. What was going on here?
Afterwards his proclamation, he and I talked. We do that a lot in
the car. Sometimes when we try to talk when his mom is around,
there are generally distortions of what we [he and I] are trying to
communicate. I had to realize that no matter how many people he
hears, he knows I'm there, and it can be distracting. He didn't have to
say that, but I realized it on my own. Especially when he told me
he was having trouble focusing, and concentrating on his game. I
had to learn to shut up, or not come.
Many fathers don't understand this. You hear them at the games,
and if there is a star, ball hog, or force to be reckoned with on the
floor, it's generally not to hard to figure out who the dad is, even if
you don't hear, ‘that's my son.'
Later, Jeremy and I had a chance to talk about something serious.
He wanted to be more focused on his game, and maybe I could help him
with developing mental toughness, with my commitment to shut up.
It was also a time when I could reiterate to him the importance of a
back-up plan, in case basketball just doesn't pan out. Involving
ourselves in their lives doesn't mean controlling their lives, as I
mentioned last week.
Still, I had to step back. I told him about getting into the
zone. I talked to him about developing a way to shut the world
out. I talked about Vygotsky and ZPD [zone of proximate
development] where learning is at its optimum. [I never pass up
an opportunity to teach]. I told him how I learned to focus through
visualization in airborne school, and how I managed to shut things out
before I performed on stage. I told him I understood the
importance of him having one less distraction on the court.
So sometimes dads we have to listen to them. Sometimes when we
are told we are being embarrassing, believe it, and maybe we should
take it as a wake-up call to do something different. In my son's
case, I could watch him more attentively, take notes, and offer my
comments as he asked for them. I realize I'm cultivating a very
independent spirit. So I have to learn how to be involved, play that
role, and let him be in control. It's just another way of showing
him how much I love him, and help me become a better father by being a
better man about stuff like this.
Archie Wortham lives with his wife, Suzan of 23 years, and their two
sons Myles (12), and Jeremy (16) in Universal City, Texas, a suburb of
San Antonio. Retired from the military in 1996, for nine years he wrote
a dad's column originally called "Jeremy's Dad," then called
"Jeremyles' Dad," named after both his sons. He now writes a column in
San Antonio called "Men 2 Fathers." Archie also maintains the Fatherhood site,
you may contact him by email at
