The Sports Wannabe

Sometimes we have moments that give us perspective. The proverbial slap in the face to remind you that “it could be worse”. The moment when your shoulders slowly slump, your eyes glaze over, and you can feel the moment sink into every bone in your body. For a moment, your world has equilibrium. Can you remember the last time you felt this?

It may seem naive, and it may feel as if you have heard this same bullshit thrown at you time and time again. You may even suggest I misread the cough medicine directions again. But, lets be honest, how else does one follow up a column on the NFL draft?

I want you to stop everything. Turn off the TV, iPod, and laptop (no wait! keep that on… just close TMZ.com). Stop doing your make up or slathering more hair gel on. Stop and just think with no distractions.

Since, I can assume you haven’t done any of these things, turn off your laptop now. I don’t want you reading this. You are too self absorbed, too stressed, and have drank a wee bit too much mass media Kool-Aid to be here.

For those of you who actually set down your (insert radiation emitting device here), and decided to read, and those of you whose ego is too big to do something the screen told you to do, I will continue.

Today, I had the pleasure of dealing with an individual who helped me more than she could have ever imagined. She was displeased with my handling of her computer repair. It had been out too long, I had been rude, the lighting wasn’t right and the humidity was not to her liking. As I explained to her that the viruses her pornography habit spawned were causing the delay. Naturally, she angrily “explained” she had never looked at such content and was offended that I would suggest such an act from a woman of such high moral fiber. More Bullshit.

As I was reamed by this valued customer, my eyes wandered to the right of the bulging vain in said customer’s head. I watched as a distraught soul in a burgundy coat wrestled with a power cable. I walked away from the sweating, and now purplish mound of anger to assist the now hog tied woman whom had drawn me in moments earlier.

As I reached for the cable to help assist, she recoiled when seeing my hand.

“Oh, I didn’t mean to scare you… can I give you a hand?”, I implored.

“Ye.. yes, thank you.”, the woman uttered from under the heavy wool hat.

As I helped organize the pile of computer components that Mary had been wrangling, she explained the reason for her trip. She wanted pictures taken off of her computer, and turned into a photo CD. As she attempted to pull the worlds from her jumbled mind, her eyes wandered across the ground, looking for confidence to make it through this conversation.

Throughout the process of finding the exact folder to extract the photos from, Mary explained to me that this was her son’s computer. She read the exact folder location from a piece of paper. Her son had written her directions, on his goodbye note, before he ended his life at age fourteen. He had set aside photos for her, that he wanted to comfort her with.

I tell you all this not in attempt to pry a tear from your eyes or sound dramatic. I’m not making this for a future chain letter that I will distribute through whatever social networking site is in vogue 4 years from now. I only did this for me, and I decided to bring a few of you along.

I asked you to free yourselves of distractions while you read this. This wasn’t an attempt to have you pay closer attention and attempt to comprehend my superiority . I just wanted you to feel the emptiness that Mary is confronting. She can’t numb the pain with television pundits, Plain White T’s songs, or a text message.

Obviously, most of us could never truly feel the pain of loosing a child in this manor. But, we can expose ourselves to the real world. We can quit numbing ourselves with excess. The real world isn’t normally sad. But the only time we see through the smoke emitted from society’s hash pipe is during tragedy.

Next time you decide to lay into someone over an “injustice”, or decide to slam a celebrity for the way they live theirs lives, take a moment to wipe away the fog. Ask yourself, “was this the darkest day of my life? Is this worth reacting as if it was?”.

Soak it up. You just thought for yourself.

Till the next time I get it,

Samuel