Month: November 2024

Once a Proud  Coach…Now a Bad Fan

/ cigarman501 / 4 Comments

“… the only thing worse than losing is not playing” ― Cormac McCarthy, The Passenger

I’m struggling. There are too many memories surrounding me…or too few. I really thought the college football season would provide a soothing anodyne. Something to take my mind off the way things are. A possible reminder of the way things once were. Football has not been a soothing anodyne.

I once “lived” for football season, whether I was coaching it or sitting in the stands watching…or from the comfort of my recliner. My bride was a fan too, especially College Game Day and Lee Corso. She would find kids that she could love and pulled for them as if she knew them. Linda never met a “human interest” story she didn’t love. She always pulled for the ones who had overcome some type of tragedy. God I miss her.

I haven’t felt the zing, and it is not totally because I’ve lost the most important person in my life. I’m sure that is a part of my lack of enjoyment but mostly I am not zinging because of what football has turned into.

NIL, transfer portal, too much video review, too much SEC hype, mostly off the field things have robbed me of my zing.

Once we played athletic games for the enjoyment of playing athletic games. Now every game seems to be a business opportunity. I foresee a time when players will be wearing the name of their sponsor on the back of their jersey instead of their own.

There was a time when we preached “hard work will pay off.” Now, if we are not instantly gratified, we move on to another team via the transfer portal. “Hurrah for me and the hell with everybody else!” seems to be our cheer.

When I began coaching back in the dark ages of “three yards in a cloud of dust”, we taught loyalty and love for our team and teammates. We taught fair play and behaving yourself. How many times did I preach, “Remember who you are and where you come from. Do nothing to embarrass your school, yourselves, your parents, and your coaches. Go out and make your parents proud.”  I’m not sure that would go over well with today’s players. Have I become too jaded?

Don’t get me wrong. I do think players should benefit from their NIL but jumping from team to team because one team has boosters with deeper pockets is ruining the game for me. The same is true of coaches jumping ships and leaving the players they recruited high and dry.

Unlike economics, the NIL has trickled down to the high school level where I spent forty-one years coaching. I’m not sure I could coach in this environment.

I’m writing this on what is known as “rivalry weekend.” The weekend began yesterday, the day after Thanksgiving. Georgia and Georgia Tech fought through eight overtimes last night. I didn’t have a dog in the fight although I tend to pull for whomever Georgia is playing against. It was a hard-fought game that I should have found exciting but I found myself almost ambivalent. It is as if I’m watching out of habit…because watching is what I should be doing.  

Today I do have a dog in the fight, so I’ll leave self-evaluation until tomorrow. Until then “Go Tigers.”

Image was found on Pinterest with no citing.

The Witching Hour

/ cigarman501 / 6 Comments

The Witching Hour

“Monsters are real, and ghosts are real too. They live inside us, and sometimes, they win.”                   ― Stephen King

As a child I believed the witching hour was the hour after midnight. As an adult I have found it to be the 3 am hour, an hour that can often encompass the rest of the night. As much as I might wish to be haunted by certain ghostly specters, most of the spells cast upon me emanate from my own mind and create monsters that wish to consume my soul.

I once dwelled on issues that amount to little…the molehills of life.  Questions such as “Should I have bought toilet paper” when I last went to the grocery store or is there some hidden malady hiding in my water heater causing it to breakdown when I next need hot water. These issues are random and silly but rob me of my needed sleep.

I live in an old farmhouse, over one hundred and twenty years old. During the quiet of the witching hour, the house creaks and pops in the same way I creak and pop when I first arise in the morning.

The puppies squirm and whimper as they dream whatever puppy dogs dream about. Mice play in the attic…I really need to go up and check on what damage is being done. Something else for me to dwell upon while I wait for the sun to appear.

Lately my witching hour doesn’t dwell on the silly or random. Lately, my reflections focus on my bride. It has been seven months, but her death is still fresh and cutting. Many days I walk into the house expecting to find her puttering about, her dark mane of hair framing her smiling face and twinkling brown eyes.  I am heart wrenchingly disappointed.

The witching hour was the time Linda would attempt to get up, on her own, and go to the bathroom. After several falls my puppies and I learned to wake up with her. It is a habit I can’t seem to rid myself of.

In the dark of the witching hour, I struggle to see the youthful and energetic Linda Gail. I must force myself to purge the memories from the final year of her life, struggling to replace visions of sickness and pain with memories of the special times in our life.

My recent dreams seem to trigger the witching hour. My dreams have a common subject, being lost. Common locations can be seen but I can’t find my way to them. With every twist and turn they seem farther away, or sometimes, disappear totally.

I am lost on streets or bizarre corridors that shouldn’t exist. I encounter old friends along the way, folks I haven’t seen in years…many now dead. They are no help, their directions causing me to become more lost. In the dream I grow fearful and anxious.

I awaken and find that fear and anxiety are real. I lay quietly attempting to regulate my respiration before getting up and staggering outside to attempt to calm my panic with a cigar. My faithful companions come with me, guarding me until I rise to return to bed. A return to sleep rarely occurs.

I don’t need someone with a medical degree in psychology to explain the origins of my dreams. I am lost… in the dark or in the light of day, I am lost without my rudder. The seas are stormy, and I have no way to steer.  “The monsters are real, and the ghosts are real too.”

***

On a brighter note, before Linda’s transition I released the book, “Food for Thought.” It can be purchased in paperback or downloaded at http://tinyurl.com/yrt7bee2