Yesterday was the best North London Derby for me, ever, and for a reason I don’t think anyone might expect.
Beating Tottenham? Great. Beating them with beautiful play from our sublime right wing and seeing him cup his ears in response to misguided (though predictably stupid) taunts? Super. Our goalkeeper making a terrible mistake but showing the mental strength to not let it impact the rest of his game? Excellent. And the online banter afterwards, the schadenfreuede and elation over winning another NLD? Welcome and so satisfying. All good, but nothing that would ever make it “the best”.
The real joy came from something that I didn’t even know happened when it happened. I was driving, on a 3+ hour return trip from seeing my parents, in the car with the family, endlessly tapping my left foot against the driver-side door, angst and nerves consuming me. Riding shotgun was my 19 year old son. My son is neurodivergent. He loves sports but cannot watch sports. The events of any given game make him anxious. He knows everything about Arsenal, world football, the Knicks, the Mets, etc. But bad, or unexpected results have, in previous spells, led to dysregulation and incredibly difficult circumstances for him and for all of us who were around him. For anyone who is neurotypical, who thinks a game not going their way is rough emotionally, I challenge you to watch someone on the spectrum have to deal with the psychic pain of that disappointment. During the pandemic it rendered Arsenal a non-option for me (hence I disappeared from social media and mostly had to cease watching the team I love so much). I gave that up willingly, with difficulty, for him. This disappearance was in solidarity with my son, who grafted a devotion of his own to Arsenal out of mine.
Yesterday in the car he gave me limited score updates. I asked him first if he wanted to follow the game and he said yeah, he’d be fine. “City are winning the league anyhow, so it’s no big deal”, he said. No details, though: his phone is restricted (by his own design) to sites that only offer scores but little in the way of details.
1-0. No idea how. 1-1, then back to 1-0 shortly thereafter and a high five. 2-0. 3-0. Halftime. Some perhaps too-confident proclamations. A deep breath, and a mid-Connecticut traffic-less interlude. While his ability to cope with stress has improved over the past two years we all have some trauma from the moments back in ‘20 through early ‘22 when he couldn’t hold it together. So the drive, which was uneventful, was still laced with my own nervousness – about the game and, more importantly, about what might happen if things went south.
As the time passed I made little milestones for myself, tinged with a kind of compulsive superstition. If we make it three miles and my son doesn’t give me bad news that’s good. If we make it three exits then all will be well and I can breathe. Then 3-1. No idea how, why, or what happened. Better that way. But still, it was 3-1, and late. And then silence. Nothing. No updates. I kept eyeing the clock. Counted the exits. Watched the odometer. I knew when the second half had started so I also new it was approaching stoppage time. But no info on how much there was. Or the status. Nothing. So, I presumed it was 3-1, and thankfully nothing was happening. 10:51, 10:52, 10:53, and still silence from the next seat over. Finally, around 10:58, I hear a “YES!” and my son tells me it’s over. We won! A little fist bump and a deep breath and he says “it was 3-2”. “3-2?”, I say? Yes, he answers. He says “Tottenham got a penalty and it was 3-2 but I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to get nervous”. I couldn’t believe it.
And THAT was the best result of the day, and that simple sheltering of information was what made it the best NLD I have ever had. This kind of act, this kind of response to stress, was unthinkable just 12-18 months ago. He protected *me*. He managed his own stress, actually engaged with it, while removing mine. My vulnerable son took care to shield his old, ostensibly mature father from the nerves of a late frenzy in a do-or-die NLD, and took the vulnerability on himself. That’s no small feat. It was incredibly brave, for him to risk his own emotions in that moment. I can’t describe what that means for him (way more than what it means for me) as an emotionally developing and neurodivergent teen.
It was the best NLD ever.