25 years...Really?

It's been 25 years.  Has it really been 25 years since I graduated from good ole HHS?  Are you kidding me?  25 years?  I can remember my mom being 25 years old.  I can remember being 25 years old.  I have been out of school longer than kids who graduated from high school seven years ago.  There have been four Presidents since I graduated.  Since 1988, we went from cassette players with headphones playing a mixtape to ipods playing thousands of songs on a smaller device.  We have gone from the Cold War to the War on Terrorism.  Wow!  I sure don't look like I did back then, I sure don't move like I did back then, but my shooting form is still as sweet as back then, and I can still throw a curve for a strike, when my shoulder isn't killing me.

The glory days, right?  Back when you had zero responsibility and all you had to do was play sports.  You would walk the halls of the school or the streets of the town and people knew who you were for one reason, you played for the local team.  Open gym, open field, playing in the park, hanging out, doing what you wanted within the confines of what your parents told you to do and would allow.  Scoring 27 or 33 points in a game and seeing your name in the headlines, nice.  Hitting game winning homeruns or throwing a no-hitter against your rival...you were the king of the world.  Or at least you thought so.  There couldn't be anything bigger than me, right? 

And yet, it seems that when you are that age, all you want to do is become an adult and get out of that little small town because you want to be treated as an adult.  Then you become an adult and you want to run back to high school and be that person who doesn't have to worry about mortgage payments, children, your parents aren't aging, or electric, water, and grocery bills.  Teaching, I see it every year.  Seniors lose all motivation to finish out the academic year, they want to be gone from the halls of high school.  Then they get a taste of the real world and the lack of order and discipline and we start to see them visiting by the beginning of school through the first year they are out.

I believe so many kids today do not take advantage of being a kid.  They want jobs for extra money, they want to be free! They want to grow up too fast and I blame us parents on that to some extent.  Kids today will quit playing a sport for so many reasons, some legit and some not.  But how often will you get a chance to be a part of anything like high school athletics?  I can answer that for you, once, unless you get into coaching.  And I am not so sure that isn't one of the main reasons that I got into education and coaching, for that feeling of maybe never having to grow up.  I don't care what people say, being a teacher and a coach is one of the coolest jobs you can have, of course, it is one of the local jobs where everyone has an opinion on how you are doing, but you are dealing with their children.

I get to walk the halls of a school and coach the athletes and prepare them for life after this sheltered atmosphere they exist in now.  I get to open the gym in the summer, have fall, winter, spring and summer breaks.  I get to be a "kid" every day, yet I am not anymore, I am in charge.  It's funny because when I was in school, I kind of thought the teachers only existed within the confines of the school, I didn't actually think they were people like my parents or other adults I knew.   

Two years ago when I thought of the looming 25 year anniversary, I was sick to my stomach.  My gosh, my mortality smacked me square in the face, I was getting old.  How much longer do I have to live, or live a quality life if I have been out of high school for 25 years?  But, I feel so differently today about that than I did two years ago.  I guess surviving a life threatening event will do that to you when it comes to perspective on life.  25 years, really?  Awesome...I made it this far.

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Stop and Think

Cold Spring Break in Myrtle Beach, S.C.

High of 55 Fahrenheit with wind coming out of the northwest at 20 plus MPH.

 

 

Boston Bruins pre-game on April 18th.

Watch this all the way through to the Nationl Anthem.  It is emotional and moving.

 

 

The Boston Marathon and Indiana Basketball

(Patrick, Jr. is coach in middle, Pat, Sr. is to the right)

I do not care who it was that was responsible for the bombing at the Boston Marathon.  I don't care if it were a Muslim extremist, a right wing Christian fanatic, a ticked off teenager, or somebody that hates our government; it was terrorism.  It was the type of stupid violence that, it seems, we are going to have to get used to, unfortunately.  To see a wonderful day like Patriot's Day end the way it did is beyond wrong.  So many innocent people were injured or killed while attending what should be a wonderful spring day and the Boston Marathon in Boston, Mass.  Within one week, we now know who allegedly perpetrated these acts on the innocent people of Boston and justice has been served. It is amazing, however, how something that happens so far away can touch you personally.

My friend Pat Rady, Jr. was running in the race and was two tenths of a mile from the finish line when the first bomb went off.  He was about 30 seconds from the second bomb going off and then stopped in his tracks and was then unable to proceed to the end of the race due to the bombings.  In an email, he wrote to me:   "It was an experience I hope no one ever has to go through. I was off pace about 5 seconds a mile because of slower traffic, I should have been crossing right at the time of the explosion. My dad was given a VIP pass two days before or he would have been on the side of the bombing trying to get a picture of my brother and I finishing. God definitely has other plans for me and I know I need to step up and witness more."

Pat, Jr. was the head coach at Southwestern (Hanover) for a couple years when I was the head coach at Henryville and we became friends due to that competition.  He and I have had many conversations about what really matters most in life and you would think that something like this would not be needed for him to appreciate even more what matters most.  But he is taking it as a wake up call in his life and I believe we all need those from time to time whether it is an EF-4 tornado or the unfortunate acts of some deranged person and hurting innocent people.  We can take such a horrible, negative act and make it a positive if we choose to.  To be honest, if I were personally involved as a parent, I don't know if I could do that.  I would try, but it would be much harder, I know.

Pat's dad is Pat Rady, the head coach at Cloverdale and previously the long time basketball coach at Terre Haute South.  He was in the bleachers across from the explosion only because of the fact he was given a VIP pass two days before.  Pat Rady is the all-time wins leader in boys' basketball for active coaches with 720 wins.  He is third on the all time list overall behind only Jack Butcher at Loogootee and Howard Sharpe.  Pat Rady has coached Indiana all stars and won many games, but he was the first person to reach out to me due to some of my writings and a friendship has developed.  That's just the kind of person that he is.  He and his son are two of the best people that I know, the types of people who walk the walk of their beliefs.  Pat, Sr. wrote me and said:  "Coach:  Thank you for your thoughtfulness and prayers.  All are very much appreciated. Yes, I hope I never witness what I was a witness to see at the Boston Marathon.  However, I know you were in a situation like that last spring, thus, you know we may never get those sights out of our mind. Though we both know, Jesus will provide and we will continue with His help. Thanks again for your kind e-mail.  God Bless!!"

How many of us take for granted what we are given?  How many of get up and start each day not taking in the blessings that we all have been given?  How many of us forget that life is full of small things and the blessings are in the small things.  The Radys' were in Boston for a guys' weekend with father and two sons.  Pat's brother Michael had finished earlier in the race about 12 minutes before the explosion.  The Rady's were, like all of us, taking for granted that they would be there, they would finish up and then would get together and head home.  Sometime later after the bombings, the Rady men were able to meet up again. They met up at a yogurt shop where the younger Patrick had finally stopped to get a drink of water. Although almost all downtown businesses were closing, the shop owner stayed around until Patrick was reunited with his family.  I am sure that the embrace and tears from their reunion reinforced to them that you will never know when it is your time to leave this world.  You will never know when saying "good bye" is the last time you will do so.  Thankfully, for them, they were able to meet up again and to appreciate each other even more than usual for a chance to see each other again. 

I pray that we all learn from these type of things, that if it happens directly to us or not that we remember how truly blessed we are just by being alive.