YOU GOT BENCHED. THEN WHAT?

Your favorite fading sports star got benched.

It happens sooner or later.

They couldn’t play up to standards anymore.

It’s worse when it happens to a promising star with everything in front of them.

The pressure got to them, they got hurt, and lost their way.

It happens to everyone eventually. We all get benched.

Then what?

Jimmy was the latest in a long line of ‘can’t miss’ football players,

He first got benched in the eighth grade for being so big and fast that he was a danger to the other kids on the field.

When he did play he had to go half-speed.

By the time he got to high school he was as big and fast like he had been, and kept getting bigger and faster while he un-learned going half-speed.

His senior year he was a star and got the D-1 scholarship everyone wanted, but he was no scholar.

He liked the parties and the party girls and party boys who didn’t have to get up early to work out, or study, or get better than they were the day before.

Jimmy got benched by his choices, lost his scholarship, dropped out of school, got dropped by his party boy and party girl friends who liked having a bonafide D-1 football player around, not some lug who could drink more beer than any three of them put together.

He faded into the mists of what could have been, forgotten by those who met him during his brief moment in the spotlight.

 

That Bench

I was sitting in the shade late one afternoon watching soccer drills performed by little kids, one of which was my granddaughter.

As an old hand in the youth coaching scene I scanned the assembled parents, grandparents, friends and neighbors, looking for the next ‘can’t miss’ star, when I noticed a young mother and father who looked to be very fit.

She was strong and trim, he was huge and trim, like you’d expect in a D-1 football player close up.

Since they were sitting beside me I listened in on their conversations, as writers are required to do.

It’s only eavesdropping and rude if you’re not a writer.

At precisely the right moment I asked him where he was from. Their kid dispalyed all of the characteristics you look for in sports, especially soccer.

A future star, he had the basics down before he showed up: kick the ball in the net, and listen to the coach.

The dad grew up local. He might have been the right age as a recent superstar. I asked.

They’d played on the same high school football team.

He went D-1, played a little, got hurt, got benched, studied hard, and graduated.

What happened to the other guy?

 

Me: You played on the same team?

Them: He was the only person I’ve ever known who was bigger and faster and stronger than everyone else and didn’t have to work at it.

Me: You guys were friends? What was he like?

Them: We were teammates. I had a job and studied, he had parties and recruiting trips.

Me: Where is he now?

Them: Last I heard he was training for MMA.

 

Get Off The Bench

One benching is not the same as another.

I self-benched in college, dropping out after freshman year to save the time and money of dropping out later.

I hadn’t planned on dropping out, but being a career college student and hanging around campus didn’t feel right, and that seemed the direction I was headed.

Was joining the Army and shipping out for Philadelphia better than Ashland and Southern Oregon College?

Now I know the difference.

Was ditching the Army after my enlistment and signing up as an English major at the University of Oregon better than staying in Philly?

It’s all part of the learning curve.

If one thing is better than another, is it a decision based on experience, or wishful thinking?

Experience is a hard truth.

This baby boomer blogger, a writer writing in real time, gets at ‘universal truths’ through first hand knowledge of marriage, being married, staying married, and having kids who turned out to be millennials who value education.

Just before I slid into a latter-day version of a campus droop wandering around a bewildering world by changing the campus to my NW Portland neighborhood, and switching classrooms with professors for apartments with single ladies, I got off the bench.

I went from living alone and riding my bike or walking wherever I went, to suburban husband and dad with a wife, two kids, and a Tri-Met bus pass.

It was a nice bench but I haven’t looked back.

 

It Doesn’t Happen Overnight

During the journeys and travels through life’s twists and turns you notice things by paying attention.

Is it just another shitty day, or is it TODAY?

If you pay attention you know the answer.

When a wife and kids depend on you, it’s always TODAY, said like “Ta Da!”

Try and keep the magic of unlimited possibilities alive in yourself and those around you.

Good morale, high morale, is what you want in the house.

When those in the house leave the house, make sure they take a dose of high morale with them into their world.

Under the right conditions people with compatible morale meet and get married and have kids.

That it happens in that order is always a nice surprise.

 

You got benched, or benched yourself, and one bench looks as good as any other.

But someone passes by your bench, walking a section of path you hadn’t noticed.

You look, they look, and you both notice there aren’t any benches on the trail ahead.

 

I was looking back to see if you were looking back to see
If I was looking back to see if you were looking back at me
You were cute as you could be standing looking back at me
And it was plain to see that I’d enjoy your company

 

PS: When you get off the bench and take that first steps together in a new direction, check your balance.

 

PSS: It’s okay to lean on each other a little.