In the rhythm of my childhood in a previous century, Labor Day was followed by the U.S. Open tennis finals, and then came back-to-school. There wouldn’t be any Christmas stuff on the shelves of CVS for months, in part because there was no CVS.

 

While my own children grew up with a different rhythm, the feeling of mid-September has not changed. You can see it in the high, blue sky, the cool of the evening (finally), and the sound of the high school marching band. Where I live, you can hear them when they’re practicing — somehow, the notes travel through the streets from a mile away — and home games are part of the civic soundtrack of Friday nights.

 

It’s something that can’t be scraped and fed into a data center.

 

Mrs. Arace and I are lucky in that it wasn’t until our seventh child put on a cap and gown that we heard a valedictorian make a joke about ChatGPT in his graduation speech. The smartest kid in the school used a bot to help him write term papers, nudge-nudge, wink-wink, ha-ha-ha. That was four years ago. I can only imagine what educators are facing now. 

 

I mention this because AI can’t touch the marching band. Indeed, there are parts of back-to-school that remain much the same as they were in the previous century, parts that Kevin Rouch and his staff cover so well here at CBUSsports.

 

Scores of studies have described the benefits of sports (and other extracurricular activities). Student-athletes have higher grade-point averages, perform better in core classes, and miss fewer school days. If their coaches are any good, student-athletes learn the importance of a work ethic, the meaning of teamwork, the joy of collective achievement, the right way to handle loss, and so forth.

 

I could switch gears here and rant about how the expansion of club sports and the infiltration of pay-to-play have cut into what has been a great American idea — the marriage of sports to schools, which began with the prep schools in the East in the early 19th century and then grew into a democratic ideal. But that is a story for another day.

 

High school sports, when done right, are a wonderful thing for promoting lifelong fitness, developing moral character, things that are so hokey, AI can’t touch them. Because they can’t be faked.

 

Mrs. Arace raised eight wonderful children, and she let me help. We went to hundreds of soccer games and cross-country meets and, at this stage of our lives, we miss them dearly. Our oldest daughter, who ran in middle school, high school and college, is a high-school teacher now; when she got a side job as an assistant XC coach at her school, Mrs. Arace was as happy as I’ve seen her since before our wedding. We go to meets, run around and pretend we have some skin in the game! How exciting!

 

I myself spent many years “coaching” youth soccer, which is to say I sat in a chair, kept track of minutes and admired my co-coaches who knew what they were doing. Every once in a while, I’d yell, “Play with joy!”

 

This attitude was shaped by my father, who had six boys and was compelled to sit through hundreds of baseball games. Carm would set his lawn chair way up there on the hill beyond the outfield. You could see him, but you couldn’t hear him.

 

There was no technical advice, not during the game. There was no yelling at umpires, or any other loud exclamations. 

 

After the game, he had a hug ready, and he’d ask about this or that. Maybe, he might offer a word about how the left shoulder was flying open. My mother, a perfectionist, might say something under her breath about the grounder I booted in the third inning, but she’d stop there and smile. 

 

It was the same, right on through high school.

 

It was a life lesson Carm passed on to me without saying anything: When it comes to sports, the best place for a parent is in a lawn chair way up there on the hill beyond the outfield. 

 

I mean that metaphorically. I’m not dismissing the parental experience, the friendships that can be formed in the stands, the collective camaraderie, and so forth; Mrs. Arace and I loved the Friday night cross-country carbo-load parties, and we often think of crashing one for old times’ sake.

 

Let the kids be coached, and let them learn all the wonderful things that can be learned, for good and for ill, while having fun with their friends. 

 

See them and support them.

 

It’s that time of year.