This Is Not For You

As kids, a lot of our parents told us that we can do anything we want. I've come to believe that this is always a boldfaced lie.

And that's a good thing.

When you're young, you have all these hopes and dreams in a wide world of possibilities, that will invariably get whittled down over a long and slow process of living on this planet. I figure, there's so many things that are going to end up killing your spirit in life, why start the process too early? Let kids run around through their early years, thinking that Santa exists and that life is fair and that being an astronaut is a realistic goal for a career. Which, again, it is possible at some point. But it's such a lofty goal for a program that our country isn't even really active in at the moment, and even when the U.S. is doing it, literally the best people who have perfect grades and are in perfect shape will still probably wash out and not make the cut. So an adult would want to temper their expectations. But a kid who doesn't know any of that and will probably change their dream at some point soon? Let 'em dream, what's the problem?

So, yeah, lie to your kids about what they can do. Tell them they can do anything they want.

You might want to mention, however, that they can't do everything.

And not just kids. No one can. There's not a soul on this earth that is going to be good at everything. Why would you want to be good at everything? Do you know how long that would take? Imagine being a lawyer who has a medical degree, and can play the piano, and is good at tennis, and is a Grandmaster at chess, and knows geography, and can quote philosophy, and speaks 3 different languages. That sounds exhausting to do even all of those things, and I didn't even begin to list "everything" that a person could be good at. We've all met those people that seem to be good at everything. And you know what those people are when they're not around everyone else? TIRED. And probably some degree of miserable too. And why? Because there literally is not enough time to be good at everything, even if you were capable of becoming good at all those things individually. And you know damn well that of all the stuff out there, there's gonna be a whole lot of shit that you don't want to do along the way. Again, stuff you could do, but have no actual interest in. So... just don't do those things.

You know what I mean though, some stuff you'll need to at least know about. You'll need to know enough about taxes to pay them each year. Doesn't mean you have to study tax law and become an accountant. You should probably be familiar with how to drive a car at some point, but you are not required to be the best race car driver that ever lived. I mean, you should know how to live healthy and perhaps even be able to get in relatively good shape. You do not, however, have to train like you're trying out for the NFL combine.

I guess football is a good example of this for me. Not that I'm good at everything else, but still. I always liked watching football. I did not always like playing.

See, I was not a very good football player. I could run, I could catch, I could even kind of throw for a while. All those individual parts and tasks of being a football player, I could do them one at a time just fine. But I wasn't a good player for most of the time I played competitively. You see, I didn't have the mind for it. To be a good player, you have to be able to practice with others and play with others at a certain speed. It's not enough to be able to practice on your own and have these skills down when you can control the circumstances. You have to be able to perform in the game, with pressure on and 11 guys on the other team trying to stop you. And as much as i could practice and get to a spot that I thought I was ready, almost every game I ever played in involved at least one moment where I completely froze or forgot what I was doing and I gave up a big play or screwed something up. And as a result, I got benched very often, to the point that I didn't really get a chance to develop any confidence on the field, and plus I just started hating playing like that.

I still remember the moment that I figured out that football was not going to be my thing.

It happened in 8th grade. Our team was playing one of the middle schools in Coppell, a few cities over from us that we didn't usually play. They had this enormous stadium and they had a ton of fans show up for some reason, what felt like a couple thousand and it was louder than I'd ever played in before. And I was the starting cornerback on the left side. For those of you that don't know, a cornerback is a defensive player that covers the wide receiver positions. You have to be able to run along side the wide receiver and either prevent them from making a catch, intercept the ball yourself, or be ready to make a tackle downfield if someone gets around the defensive line. Obviously there's a little more too it than that, but the point is that a cornerback is doing a lot of running and has to work in a lot of open space.

Well, I was playing against this kid, a little bit shorter than I was, and he was jus staring at me when we lined up. Staring angrily. I mean, real malevolent look, like I'd dated his sister and it didn't work out type of look. And the first or second play of the game, he runs a route straight down the field, and I try to keep up with him and time it so I can jump for the ball at the right time, and it fails miserably, the kid gets a huge gain while I'm guarding him. And as usual, the coach pulls me out, no surprise there. And I get an earful about letting my team get back field position and my lack of focus and blah frickin blah, I hated playing for that guy.

Before you ask, no, that wasn't the big moment I was talking about. That came in the 2nd half.

The coaches put me back in after we got a comfortable lead. Or were down by a wide margin, one or the other, like it matters. I was back at cornerback, and that same kid that burned me for a huge gain before was back in. Still staring angrily, like the first play he embarrassed me on wasn't enough and now he was really pissed off or something. But I wasn't worried about it this play, because our defense had called cornerback blitz. So as soon as the ball was hiked, my job was to run towards the ball and try to get a sack or tackle for loss of yardage.

(I apologize to those who don't know football lingo well enough to follow all of this, suffice it to say that I was about to do something I was more comfortable doing and that wasn't going to get me in trouble if it didn't work.)

Anyway, the ball gets snapped, and I break inside. No one seems to see me coming, which was a good feeling. Then I get closer, running full sprint, an I see the quarterback hand the ball off to the running back, so I head right for the guy. And at the last second, he sees me coming, and lowers his shoulder in my direction. And I dive in for the tackle, and I brace for impact and...

...

The next thing I remember is a voice coming from above, saying something muffled that sounded like, "mmmhpppm mhmpmpphhh  rmmmmph". And I realized I was in a pile of kids on the ground, and I was face down. And that didn't seem to be a good omen, considering I was just running at full speed and had dove right at someone coming back at me with his force. Finally, someone helps me stand back up, and I look down, and the running back I was coming for a few seconds ago is laying on the ground, beneath where I was, and he looks hurt. And I can hear people from the sideline cheering for some reason, and a few of my teammates run over to me and are slapping me on the helmet and saying things like, "Good job!" and "That's the way we hit, boy!"

I try to smile and just play it off for a sec. Then I grab one of my friend's that's on the field, who we'll call Josh. Actually, it was Josh, what am I saying? Josh was there.

So we have a few minutes there, while they help the running back off of the field. He wasn't seriously hurt, but he was shaken up for a bit. And I ask Josh, "What just happened?" To which he replies, "What do you mean, 'what just happened?'" And I explain to him and no one else that I just blacked out and don't know what I just did. And then he says, "You may have a concussion, dude. You might want to sit down." And I keep pressing him on it. "Just tell me what happened."

So in Josh's words (at least, the way I remember him telling me):

"Well, you came in to tackle that guy, and he ran into you and knocked you back. I saw it and thought you were gonna go flying. But as you were falling, you grabbed onto him and kind of flung him around and piledrove him into the ground. Looked pretty cool. Oh, and he fumbled the ball while he was flying through the air, and a bunch of other guys jumped in, trying to get the ball. I think they got it back for their side, but it was still a pretty sweet play. So he's still on the ground though. Are you sure you're alright, though?"

So I didn't come out of the game, even though I definitely think I should have in retrospect. The next play I covered the wrong guy and let another big gain happen, but I didn't get benched. But that was the moment I knew I wasn't gonna be a football player any longer. The moment that I do not even recall was what let me know that there were better ways to devote my time, energy, and remaining brain cells. I quit football after that year, not because of the worst play I'd ever made, but because of the best one I'd made. Can you imagine if I had to blackout every time I made a good play? I wouldn't be here, writing this. Or I would, but you'd find it impossible to read through the extra consonants and numbers in every other word typed.

I kept playing basketball for a few more years after that. Ironically, I got two different concussions playing basketball in high school, a much less violent sport. But that's not even a story. Point in all of this is, you're allowed to not be good at everything. You can read into it however you want if things don't go well on several different occasions doing the same thing. Could I have pushed through it and kept playing football? Yeah, probably. Maybe I would have been fine, and not gotten hurt again and learned the position well enough to play through high school.

Maybe another concussion and I'd be in a wheelchair.

And maybe I missed my calling and should have been playing through college and even playing on Sundays. It could have happened, right? Maybe? Who knows?

But I feel pretty good about listening to that muffled voice that woke me up when I was at the bottom of that dog pile. That voice that said, "mmmhpppm mhmpmpphhh  rmmmmph". Which I can only assume was trying to say, "Maybe this is not for you."