I spent most of my high school days running, fine-tuning my cardio-vascular system into a well-oiled machine. For someone who lived and breathed cross country, and occasionally ran a track meet or two, painful but rewarding workouts were a daily occurrence.
My best friend for much of that time was a fellow runner, one who was considerably more talented than I. Though far from chump change, my career accomplishments couldn’t hold a candle to this guy’s – an entire season of top-five finishes, several race victories, state runner-up in cross country and the 3,200 meters, district champ in three different events, etc. He was damn good.
When my career ended and the long (but more relaxing) road to physical apathy and atrophy began, I had several moments of doubt and frustration. These are the moments when I’d wonder, on a good day, “Was it really worth all the struggle?” On a bad day, the wonderings were more along the lines of “What the hell was I thinking? That running was painful.”
Luckily, dear ol’ dad came through in the clutch with some reassurance, explaining that not everyone was meant to be a cross country champion. Pops said that my friend probably could not have accomplished many of the things I had, even if he devoted all his energy to those ends – just as I was never meant to find glory on the hilly courses of sweat and mud, no matter how I tried.
The 27 of you who actually made it to campus last Wednesday and picked up a Reveille may understand why I chose to share that little morsel of reminiscence. After semesters of shedding blood and tears for the Opinion page, I finally got my fifteen minutes in the Sports section, taking on the role of “Guest Picker” for their weekly football predictions.
No bones about it, I crashed and burned. It was an unmitigated disaster. Absolutely Awful, with two capital A’s. As far as I know, I am the first guest forecaster in the history of this paper to have a losing record for my picks of the week.
Needless to say, it was areminder of my strengths and weaknesses – one of those moments of realization that no, actually, I CAN’T do anything I set my mind to. Column writing? Got it covered. 600-800 words a week? No problem. Semi-readable content? Most of the time, yep.
Apparently, though, football predictions are even less my bag than cross country was – at least I didn’t irredeemably suck at that. It was definitely time to look back upon dad’s advice and reassure myself once again. Sometimes, folks, you’re not meant to win that race – it’s not because you didn’t try, or didn’t want it bad enough – that’s just the way it goes.
To be honest, it took only one game to recognize that the entire adventure was doomed from the get-go, as top-25 Oregon fell to Utah, proving once and for all that God loves Mormons more than loggers and hippies.
How about Florida? They threw three interceptions and lost, at the Swamp no less! to Ole “Before this game we had the worst pass defense in the nation” Miss. Unbelievable.
Before I go, I’ll qualify my musings, so as to avoid promotion of the classic Homer Simpson advice, given when Bart gave up on the guitar – “If something’s hard to do, then it’s not worth doing! You just stick that guitar in the closet next to your short-wave radio, your karate outfit and your unicycle, and we’ll go inside and watch TV.”
Naturally, long-term devotion to activities which do not come naturally is oftentimes more rewarding than our efforts which come with ease. Sometimes, though, you just have to stick to your guns.
I’ll see you next week, right back here on Page 4. I’m done with Sports.