OK, the topic is "distance from home" and some great recent posts reflect the nervousness of even our seasoned parents when their sons are on stage somewhere a long way from home.
Here's a different take... we just had HS sign-ups. Record number of freshmen. Consequently, I am getting a record number of individual freshmen parent "feedback" notes, mostly via email, sending me some of the craziest questions, full bio's of sons, instructor/camp/travel team name drops, videos (yes, videos), etc. This is INCOMING HS FRESHMEN at a small school. We haven't even started conditioning yet, let alone tryouts/practice. My prospective new JV coach is having second thoughts. We've entered a whole new dimension. My reply always includes some version of... "your son is in HS now, a key initiative of our program is to get them comfortable with handling their own business and we start expecting that the day they signed up."
While the geographic distance is very minimal, so many of these parents are NOT yet ready to let their sons go the distance of finding their own way. Much work to do. Your stories provide me with always-needed perspective and patience 