The Princesses of Potomac
Just 30 minutes west of Washington D.C., Potomac, Maryland was named the most affluent town in America in 2013. Potomac is home to olympians, NBA, NFL, and MLS players, the Treasurer of the United States, U.S. Congressman, the Vice President of Nigeria and numerous other posperous people.
Traveling to Potomac the past week has been exhausting, while I leave my house 3 hours before camp starts just to sit in traffic the entire way. Working in Potomac is always different than the other camps, its known for always being a little bit more entertaining. While I don't mean to talk negatively about all of those who live in Potomac, its just the stigma around soccer camps in Potomac is that all the princess and princesses come out for this week (literally I had a kid who bragged that her and her brothers names meant prince and princess in Arabic) .While knowing the demographics of this town, I was already preparing myself on Sunday for the many parents and kids I would encounter during my week of coaching.
While I had an absolute blast with my girls for the 5 days I was their coach, their presence for 8 hours a day came with many laughs and eye opening moments. During my first day of camp or better known as (Coerver Mondayyyyy, best day of the week) , I had multiple kids late to camp, and all of them had the same excuse "Sorry I'm late, my nannie had to drop off (insert sibling's name here) at the country club." While this was mostly humorous coming from 8 year olds, all they know is summer at the country club; however, it was eye opening that this is all they knew, it would become apparent during the next 5 days as this was a reoccurring excuse.
On day 2, two of my girls would get into a fight about who lived closer to the most recent NHL Champion TJ Oshie. While this was comical to me, as someone not from Potomac, one girl explained to me that your popularity at school was based off of how many local celebrities you lived by.
Day 3, tends to be the worst day of the camp because its the middle of the week, its hot and the kids are exhausted. Day 3 was tough, very tough. While the day is filled with different games for this very reason, these kids started to drop like flies. I had several girls sitting out because they "don't like soccer" while I had others not showing up because there was a chance of rain or they "were tired and will try to come Thursday" one parent said to me.
Day 4 had arrived and I was determined to make this a good day with minimal complaints or crying kids. While we had very little complaints, what made my day was the fight about which kid had the most and more expensive Tesla's out of the camp. While day 4 was pretty uneventful and long except for the Tesla argument, the only thing that would make day 4 better was it being day 5.
With 100% chance of thunderstorms in the forecast, we scrambled to re-schuele our 5th and final day of camp. Known as a day full of competitions and prizes, it was now a day filled of screaming kids in a gym. While having to call in for more coaches to help deal with so many kids in such a small space, we made the most of it, by keeping the Coerver Friday tradition alive by playing games, competitions and World Cup.
And after this long week in Potomac, Maryland, all I could think was that the next Coerver Monday was only 2 days away....
Traveling to Potomac the past week has been exhausting, while I leave my house 3 hours before camp starts just to sit in traffic the entire way. Working in Potomac is always different than the other camps, its known for always being a little bit more entertaining. While I don't mean to talk negatively about all of those who live in Potomac, its just the stigma around soccer camps in Potomac is that all the princess and princesses come out for this week (literally I had a kid who bragged that her and her brothers names meant prince and princess in Arabic) .While knowing the demographics of this town, I was already preparing myself on Sunday for the many parents and kids I would encounter during my week of coaching.
While I had an absolute blast with my girls for the 5 days I was their coach, their presence for 8 hours a day came with many laughs and eye opening moments. During my first day of camp or better known as (Coerver Mondayyyyy, best day of the week) , I had multiple kids late to camp, and all of them had the same excuse "Sorry I'm late, my nannie had to drop off (insert sibling's name here) at the country club." While this was mostly humorous coming from 8 year olds, all they know is summer at the country club; however, it was eye opening that this is all they knew, it would become apparent during the next 5 days as this was a reoccurring excuse.
On day 2, two of my girls would get into a fight about who lived closer to the most recent NHL Champion TJ Oshie. While this was comical to me, as someone not from Potomac, one girl explained to me that your popularity at school was based off of how many local celebrities you lived by.
Day 3, tends to be the worst day of the camp because its the middle of the week, its hot and the kids are exhausted. Day 3 was tough, very tough. While the day is filled with different games for this very reason, these kids started to drop like flies. I had several girls sitting out because they "don't like soccer" while I had others not showing up because there was a chance of rain or they "were tired and will try to come Thursday" one parent said to me.
Day 4 had arrived and I was determined to make this a good day with minimal complaints or crying kids. While we had very little complaints, what made my day was the fight about which kid had the most and more expensive Tesla's out of the camp. While day 4 was pretty uneventful and long except for the Tesla argument, the only thing that would make day 4 better was it being day 5.
With 100% chance of thunderstorms in the forecast, we scrambled to re-schuele our 5th and final day of camp. Known as a day full of competitions and prizes, it was now a day filled of screaming kids in a gym. While having to call in for more coaches to help deal with so many kids in such a small space, we made the most of it, by keeping the Coerver Friday tradition alive by playing games, competitions and World Cup.
And after this long week in Potomac, Maryland, all I could think was that the next Coerver Monday was only 2 days away....
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