Watching Rachel run

Now I know why parents love watching their kids do sports. Late last month, Rachel's school did an activity called "Boosterthon," in which we had to pledge $1 per lap for our kids to run up to $35 a lap around the field at Madison Park, which is near our house.

The event was on a Wednesday afternoon, the day I was scheduled to leave for a conference in Pittsburgh, and I was giving someone from The Post a ride, but I told her we had to leave after Rachel's run. She was cool with that.

I didn't tell Rachel I was coming, and so I stood with a clutch of other parents watching her round the field with her buddies. "RACHEL!!!" I yelled, and she turned her head, and the look of pure joy on her face -- that Mommy had turned out to watch her run -- is something I'll never forget. I yelled "Go, Rachel, go!" every time I saw her round a lap, and after a while she gave me an embarrassed little smile, and at the end she said, "I RAN 34 LAPS!" and I swooped her up into my arms and said, "I'm so PROUD of you!!" and covered her with kisses.

She wanted me to stay, and then she wanted me to take her to Drew's office, but I told her I had to leave for my trip. She quickly ascertained that it wasn't a fixed time, so she said, "You don't have to be there at a certain time," and begged me to stay, but then I told her I had to pick my colleague up at the train station and she looked so sad -- so I waited until she had lined up with her class to go back inside, and then I left.