Growing up in New York City made team sports sort of difficult and coming from a family of artists, musicians and dancers, it was something we just didn't do. Living now in a small lovely town, my boys have asked to try football and I want to support them, I just don't speak that language; have never been to that country.
On top of this, I had already signed them up for sleep away camp and the dates didn't work - they're football practice has been going on for weeks and they're still away.
Today I attended and served up some well-done burgers at the annual football jamboree in my town. I put in my couple of hours of volunteer time while the other parents hustled around me, collecting dollar bills for gatorade, wrapping hot dogs in foil and walking their one, two, three and sometimes four or more children around the field to get to where they needed to be, or keeping the little ones occupied for the endless hours of helmets and shoulder pads and sweating they had no choice but to endure while older brothers stalked the field, looking for the ball, and their place in the line up.
Unlike most families there, my sons were not on the field. In fact, they're not even in the state, but instead they're hiking and swimming, playing drama games and making up skits at sleep away camp. They've missed the whole first three weeks of practice and, to my knowledge, will have a great deal of catching up to do on their return. I was told this would be all right.
While this fact alone is causing me undo amounts of stress, anxiety and borderline panic, it was fascinating to actually participate at the big event without worrying about my boys. I was a helper, but I was also observing, learning the language of this foreign country called "football," a country full of vim and vigor, ecstasy and agony, large, complex fastenings and gear, committed parents and, yes, cheerleaders.
I have to admit I'm a little embarrassed to admit I never really knew they existed. Not unlike an old acquaintance of mine who, upon hearing about my frolicking in the fire hydrant the fire department would open for the kids on hot summer days in Brooklyn remarked "I thought they just did that in the movies," I too felt that cheerleaders were really some sort of mythology of the United States; I had never really seen one.
But what I couldn't help but observe as a cultural ritual unfolded before my eyes, a tribal separating out of the sexes. The footballers, manly and tough in their big shouldered get ups, even the youngest ones; and the cheerleaders, ultra feminine with their swingy ponytails, short skirts and long-legged kicking. They weren't just 8, 9, 10 or 11-year-old kids playing. They were Boys, with a capital "B" and Girls with a capital "G". While I served and made change and watched, my fretting over my boys missing all of this slowed down and my concern shifted, instead, to the attitude of some of the older men toward the younger girls who were waiting to do their cheers; some of whom where helping me at the drink stand.
One of the younger girls asked to make change and I said, "We're letting the grownups do the money right now, but you can get the drinks" to which a father standing next to me added, "But since you're a Girl, you'll be learning how to Spend Money when you get a little older" chuckled to himself and walked away, and, in spite of my age and experience, I was shocked.
Suddenly the world of little boys and little girls was black and white and alarmingly so; and people were locked into gender stereotypes I thought we'd wrestled with in the seventies. Forty years later a little girl is supposed to be a cheerleader and grow up to learn to "Spend Money" and little boys are supposed to be football players and grow up to "Make Money."
I began to understand why my family had shied away from organized sports like these and how treacherous it could become. I will support my sons in anything they want to do but, as a casual observer today, I wonder if we're really cheering for the next generation to be the full and well rounded people they can be, or if we're continually reinforcing the stereotypes. Or maybe it's just not that simple.
Aimee Boyle is a special education teacher, mother, wife and freelance writer. She is a regular contributor to EmpowHER.