Life and Death With the Rovers

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[Just to let you know —I mention a traumatic death below.]

When my oldest son was nine, he started playing travel soccer for Coach Dudley’s brand new boys U-9 team that she named the Rovers — a reference to the UK football club of the same name.

The U-9 Rovers started as one team, then expanded to three teams over the years. If you made it onto one of the Rovers teams, you never left because it was a good team with the loudest coach you’ve ever heard who developed championship players, some of whom later went on to pro teams in Europe.

There was another part of the Rovers that flourished — the parents. Through years of running concession stands, traveling to far-away games, and staying in hotels together, long-standing friendships were cemented. The players have now graduated from college and are off into the early years of their careers — long past their Rover days — but not so for the parents.

We’re still around and we still call ourselves the Rovers.

I said to my husband the other night, “I’ll see you later. I’m off to see the Rovers.”

“The Rovers” is a group of moms and dads who still gather every 4–6 months to have a chat fest on Karmi’s back porch or in a local restaurant. Long ago we used to discuss our evolving parenthood from portable chairs along the sidelines of our sons’ games. These days we discuss aging parents, divorces, work frictions, retirement, health troubles, and updates on our kids.

Everything in life has changed except for our friendship.

Rovers were never homogenous. We came from varied backgrounds and socioeconomic positions, with kids who were a soup pot of personalities and inclinations. Our common ground was our love for the kids, for their interests, and for the Rovers. “Once a Rover, always a Rover,” we’d say.

But our shared commitment to our kids’ love of soccer wasn’t the only thing that brought us closer together. The Rovers had some extra unifying history, though not the kind you’d want.

It started in the first or second year of the team. One of the fathers passed away from cancer. He’d been battling it for a little while, and finally, cancer won. The Rovers parents went to the funeral and then offered support to the widow in the time afterward, as you would.

Then within a year, another father died. This time it was a sudden, unexpected heart attack, and we were all bereft for the player’s family. Again, funeral and support.

By the time of a third father's death, we were the kind of pros that we never wanted to be. This father, a beloved member of our soccer family, had a forklift accident at work — a shock for all. Another funeral passed us by, another holding of the widow and kids in our hearts and care.

But it wasn’t until the fourth death, which consisted of four people, that we were hit harder than we could reasonably manage. I’ll never forget that day. I worked as a recruiter in the same office as Dudley, our coach. Her phone rang, and I could hear her listening to the person on the other end with a grave tone in her voice. Then she came out with a look on her face I wish I could forget.

“Steph, that was Nancy. Bob shot his wife, the two kids, then himself — they’re all gone.”

We looked at each other in horror and utter confusion. Any innocence we might still have harbored from the world died inside us.

I still think about that funeral every time I drive past the church it was held in. I don’t think about it as much as I feel a subtle shudder, like my soul sinking into a hole. The caskets were closed that day. The extended family of the father couldn’t bring themselves to attend. The caskets of the two boys, one who played on our team, were small.

Bob was one of the kindest people you’d meet. He’d tried to take his life earlier — which we never knew — and the theory was he couldn’t bear to abandon his family on this next attempt. So, he took them with him.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

This past week I met up with The Rovers at Karmi’s back porch, as we do. Only four of us ladies could make it, and that was a treat. We could hear each other better and be part of the same conversation. Sometimes it’s a conversational zoo at these things.

The stars were sprinkled in the sky above us and there was a smooth breeze shifting the eighty-degree air all around. In other words, perfect.

We chatted for three hours. We covered a lot of ground. Jamie’s aneurysm that nearly killed her but from which she recovered, defying all expectations. Cheryl’s struggling older brother and her son’s budding music career. Kate’s house projects and workplace issues. I didn’t tell any stories, but I was a good listener.

Sometimes I come home from those gatherings having laughed myself silly. That night I left grateful to have these friends with whom I’ve shared a stretch of time. They’re a bond of knowing how life has gone for our group.

Life will do some crazy beautiful and crazy difficult things to us. I feel as if our long-term relationships become like the rings of a trunk of a tree. The closeness and familiarity are a living record of all the history that has passed. Some rings ask more of us than we think is possible. I suppose that’s why we have friends.