In my hometown, football is like a second religion. People breathe it in with the air, drink it in the water. Every decently gruff body dreams of playing football, of hitting somebody and being told it's okay. Every body, even me.
The came the first day of 8th grade practice. Full pads, full contact. It suddenly dawned on me: this game hurts. Why do people play it? It's not rational.
I struggled to get through that first season. The teachers encouraged me, my father relived his glory years through me, and my mom worried. I was scared beyond belief of the hitting. Every day I dreaded practice and the pain it would bring. Game days were worse; there I had the added fear of failing and letting the team down. But I made it through. And as I did, I swore I'd never be this stupid again.
I quit. I did not play football as a freshman.
The uproar this caused was indirect, but nonetheless nearly as painful as the game itself. Some worried I was hurt. Some called me various obscenities and spit at me. Most were simply curious. What kind of a boy doesn't want to play football? My sisters didn't care. My mother was relieved at first, but then began to wonder about me herself. My father simply returned to his television without a word.
Two years I sat out. Two years I endured the fall: the smell of the grass, of the sweat, of the dirt, lingering in my nostrils every time I passed the practice field. Oh sure, there were other guys who didn't play football. They either ran cross-country or did drugs and dropped out of high school. Neither was an option for me; I was too chunky for cross-country and just not interested in the drug scene. I was left contemplating whether or not I'd made the right decision. For two years I guarded my actions, tried to focus on academics. By the middle of my sophomore year, I was forced to recognize that something was missing in my life. My grades started slipping, my social life was abysmal. No matter how hard I tried to fix both problems, they seemed to get worse. I had wanted to try for a 4.0 in high school, but I lost that goal after the first semester. People had even finally given up on me playing football by this point. I wanted to give up on me myself.
It was then that a friend of mine, Corey Casteel, came to me. He tried one last time to convince me to play. He asked me to think about whether I'd regret not playing down the road. It was then that everything clicked. I would don the helmet and pads once more.
It was not an easy road back. But I relished in the challenge. I tried out for the track and field team to get into shape. I lifted. I ran. I competed. I loved it.
I realized what I had been neglecting all along; my body. All the time and effort I poured into honing my mind could only take me so far. The discipline it took to get into shape and prepare myself for the pain also carried over into the academic field. But getting in shape was one thing. Playing football was something else.
Football is not just a sport of brutes. It requires just as much mental effort as physical. I played offensive guard at 165 lbs, which is nearly puny. The quarterback weighed more than I did. But I knew all the plays by heart. I knew when I had to pull, when I had to block down, and most importantly, I knew the snap count. Most people would say that's pretty easy mentally. I challenge them to push a boulder up an incline a mile and a half in full pads (weighing maybe an extra five to ten pounds), stopping and starting every five yards. Here's the catch: if you jump to push the boulder before the correct count is spoken, you move back five yards. By the end of the fourth quarter, even the best athletes are challenged to mentally focus on the game.
For all its mental challenges, though, football is still an incredibly physical sport. Being hit bruises muscles, making them tougher and requiring more effort to perform, than simply running or throwing a ball. One has to put oneself willingly and even eagerly into harm's way. Which brings us full circle: Why play football?
Yes, football hurts. Yes, football is incredibly demanding, both physically and mentally. But so, for example, is rock climbing. And as the old proverb of climbing goes, I climbed the mountain 'cause it's there.
I played football as a junior and a senior. I lettered both years and our team finished 8th in the state in 1996. We weren't expected to win more than two games. We overcame losing our quarterback to knee injuries, losing our backup QB to alcohol violations, being underrated at every turn, losing two straight games by 40 or more points, and even doubting ourselves. I know I would have regretted missing even those things. Why play football? Because football is a microcosm of life. Life is not always roses and perfume. Life will hurt. Life will challenge you. Life will make you doubt yourself. Football teaches you to get through those times, to fight on even when it's all going against you. Because you know, if you push hard enough, and long enough, the elusive joy of victory is yours. You realize not only could you do it, but you did it. Football teaches you to respect and believe in yourself.
So why play football? The list is as varied as the individuals who play it. But though you may never end up on the gridiron, remember this: there's more to football than meets the eye.
I learned all this during those two years in pads at my high school. But for me, there was something more. I discovered I had deeper feelings for the sport than I ever imagined. Walking off the field for the last time in my career, I wept unabashedly. I realized I had fallen in love with the sport I had once hated so much.