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"Ah, no. Ahhhhh... no!"

*WHAM!!!* goes the crash of the locker. Another senior gone nuts. Absolutely insane. Crazed.

Welcome... one and all, to a parable in black; life through the obsessed eyes of a Saguaro football player.

"I can't take this, man. I'm not gonna make it today... I'm finally gonna kill some one. Hey, wait a minute. Maybe I can try to kill some one, then they'll kill me... I won't have to go to practice."

"Sure. Then coach'll come over and kick your body, screaming at you to get up and get to practice or he's gonna run ya. You know how he is... insane, that is."

"Yeah, yeah. I know. There's no hope. Not rain. Certainly not sleet or snow. Not death. Oh God!"

"God can't help you now... his hands are tied when it comes to The Season."

So went the grim banter of two teammates earlier this year during the football season, The Season, we call it. Two seniors. Both starters. Both big, strong, angry men. Both at the mercy of their own personal agonies. The most dreaded thing on the face of the earth stared them directly in the face: practice. Four hours of non-stop, balls-out intensity that would make any human want to check out of Hotel Life. Those that have experienced Saguaro Football rarely speak openly about it. It is brash insanity. But, hey, we won the Title, right?

* * *

This life. This life we are given is something precious. Two things come from life: the mind and the body, which, ideally, work symbiotically to provide a successful existence for each human. To many, myself included, it is far more important to enrich the mind than the body; so much more can be accomplished with it alone than with brute strength. The mind that most of us come equipped with has incredible complexity that none amongst us, as humans, can truly comprehend. Observing, thinking, creating, analyzing; that's what a mind does, regardless of whether or not the individual prefers to express his thoughts. One of the other weird and wonderful things that the human mind does is cry. The single most complex expression ever to grace the living. People have gone to great trouble to explain why it happens, but I see no reason to root out a problem or a solution to this act. It is just another essential function of the human body. Like breathing or sneezing, crying accomplishes something that no other behavior is able to do. Crying seems to cleanse the soul and clear the mind, often after a tragic moment, not taking into account the release of joyous pressure - spontaneous tears for something so fantastic words would simply not be appropriate. This intricate expression of one's self is not to be dealt with lightly, but cannot be looked at as a negative thing, either. In my life, crying has surfaced at certain times and will assuredly continue to do so a few more times before I turn in my body a few years down the road.

* * *

"Hey, guys, practice'll be all worth it when you have that ring on your finger in a couple months."

Sure, coach.

No. Nothing is worth that, period.

So I find myself staring at a young man with his head in his hands. A strong, seemingly healthy individual. The same man that has made other kids cry during the course of football games by physically brutalizing them. His flat-top haircut is still firm and square; a snug helmet hasn't been fitted over it yet; hence the agony of anticipation. He is slumped down on a wooden bench in the heart of the Institution; the place boys go to die and only men can cry.

Ahhh... the lovely feeling of the locker room bench. I wonder if coach has put up the practice schedule yet. Hmmm... nope. Okay, good. No news is better news than some news, I guess. Uh oh. Here he comes. He's smiling; that' s bad. Well, good for him, bad for us. I predict that he's going to have a good, long, beneficial practice today. I predict that we are going to go through physically and mentally detrimental hell. Here it is...

Oh.
Well, see now, that's not so good.

Oh God I hope I can make it through practice, just this once. Wait a minute. That's not the way it goes. I don't just have to go through this practice, but this one and hundreds more just like it, or worse. It is all futile. Absolutely futile. There is no end. This nightmare rolls on into the pitch black of eternal darkness. It all seems so hopeless. What are we working towards? What are we working for? No prize is worth this. The "love" of this game has long been stripped clean away from our bones. I guess all I can do now is cry...

And so I cried. And so we cried as the sun shone and the field beckoned. It was one of those days, just one of those things that are truly impossible to convey to normal humans. You had to be there, and go through that... that unmentionable pain day after day, week after week, and month after month. The tears were cleansing us, those that could not hold back; without that ultimate expression of raw emotion, we would not have gone on, the flat-topped young man and I. Eventually, all of the players had their breakdowns. It was enough to get you through the week and to the next game; closer to the end of The Season, regardless where the end came.

* * *

I sit here, alone. Yes, alone. I find myself here, or there, alone often. No, I'm not some sort of decrepit computer geek, as the stereotype goes. In fact, I am what you would call your typical high school jock, in most of the good ways, some of the bad ways, but there are a few things about me that aren't quite the same. Those who thrive on loneliness often seem depressed or weird. That isn't the case, but rather just the opposite, in my opinion, coming from the mouth of some one who enjoys being alone more than occasionally. Solitude, for me, brings a sense of peace after a certain point, so that I can think about those things that plague my conscious being. It helps me to sort out what questions I should work out with myself and what I should leave alone. It seems to be more of a mental maintenance kind of thing after awhile. But there do arrive problems for me out of this overall positive thing. The good thing is that I get to sit down and think about subjects that can help me to be a better person, but decidedly bad things come directly from this kind of thinking, also.

Not much sense is being made here... let me clarify.

Thinking: Good.
Thinking: Bad.

Huh?

While I mentally work out any minor problems, I tend to bring up dark spots of my life and involuntarily throw them into the mix. These rather difficult situations, emotions, or memories get me in trouble inasmuch as dwelling on them becomes all-too-cyclic. At a certain point of thought, this pondering goes from somewhat helpful in dealing with these "bad things" in my life, to detrimental. All of the pain, or embarrassment, or dejection comes back in full force and I more or less relive the event emotionally. Most of the time, this kind of thing is not enough to make me loose control, something I value greatly. However, these kind of experiences add on top of the overall emotional picture; just more weight on the stressed bridge of sanity. Too much dangerous thinking will either a.) drive you absolutely nuts, b.) make you boring and plain, or c.) just stress you out even more so that the breakpoint is all that much closer.

Breakpoint? Que, es eso? me preguntas.

Well, I think of a breakpoint as the point where you can't take much more of anything. No matter what it is, pain, fun, pleasure, there can always be too much of something (except the Knights of Nee[p]... there can never be quite enough of them). My breakpoint just happens to always be emotional stress, but, oddly enough, not necessarily stress in general. (?) My father is being unbearable, my brother does something stupid, some girl screws with my head, negative pondering, arguing with myself (it's really not that uncommon... come on, think about it; you have a predicament, a reasonable side, and an emotional side); they all contribute. If help doesn't arrive quickly, or slowly (I seem to have quite a tolerance after years of practice), then I finally just throw my hands in the air and admit defeat... mental bankruptcy (leave me alone). Cry.

* * *

So football season begins to leave me. Some of the pain is made dull by inactivity on the field. My subconscious suppresses the whole thing, partially. I am left to ponder what to do about next year. One would probably ask if I were going to play next year. That is a silly question, of course I'm going to play. But why?!! Well... that's not so simple.

Scholarship
Scholarship
Scholarship

There are a few answers to that question. If I were to have written a list of reasons before The Season, I would have included such crap as:

The feeling of accomplishment
Team friendship and unity (rare, in actuality with us)
Fun
The need to be the best

Granted none of the above exist in my mind regarding football anymore, but the concept of scholarship still shines brightly in the mist. Speaking truthfully, there is a chance of getting a scholarship through just wrestling, but I'm not going to take a chance on that. Besides, maybe next year will be fun. Maybe.

Within the last couple of weeks, my head football coach resigned, a new one was appointed (former assistant coach), and wrestling has truly grasped my attention. I had forgotten how much fun a sport could be. There will be no pain and angst in this season. But now I have to make some decisions. Decisions that will affect how I play football next year. They will help me, but enrage my coach; I do not plan on training with the team this summer. Instead, I shall train with my wrestling coach, a true stud. This, and other massive decisions, along with the insane pace of school, has kept me on the old emotional rollercoaster. This affects my practice, and my studying. My muscles are always tense when I'm thinking about what I have to get done, which is most of the time. I'm slowly moving away from friends in order to get things done, and I think I'm going to snap and start taking people down. Well, it might be awhile for that.

Every time I am faced with some sort of new barrage of choices and stress, I learn something about myself and how to deal with things. This helps me time and time again as I progress through life. Only through learning from past experiences, mistakes, and pain can I help myself to lessen the hurt of future blows. All I can do now is bear down and deal with whatever else comes my way, and deal with it as I know how.

Quotes of random and questionable relevance:

"Emotion is the chief course of all becoming-conscious. There can be no transforming of darkness into light and of apathy into movement without emotion."

-Carl Gustav Jung
Psychological Aspects of the Modern Archetype

"You wanna go out 'cause it's raining and blowing
You can't go out 'cause your roots are showing
Dye 'em black
Black No. 1"

-Type O Negative

All fear exposure with their roots showing.

"Base not your joy upon the deeds of others, for what is given can be taken away."

-Peter Steele

Sites of Related Interest
Godel's Proof and The Human Condition: The Basic Essays

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