Life's Rich Pageant

Humans are interesting. We can be majestic, self-sacrificing, alturistic, petty, duplicitious, self-centered, rationalizers without peers, and just downright hateful. One person can even have several good and bad points co-exisiting concurrently. I guess that is the human condition. Its RL and its the other one also.

Lemme lay some RL on you. I teach, do you really? LOL, and have had the pleasure to get to know a person with whom I share some commonalities. This person was our baseball coach this year. Had a very successful year but had the unmitigated gall to suspend, for the remainder of the season, some of his best players because they were involved in some criminal activity. As a result they lost some games and quickly bowed out of the playoff picture. Maybe I'm nuts but I think he did the right thing.

How was this stand supported? A storm of controversy engulfed this man and his family. He was cursed during games, one drunken buffon threatened him physically after a game, and the piece de resistance? His 5 year old son answered the phone and was cursed for being his fathers son. Little guy went up to his dad and said, "Why did some man on the telephone call me*************"?

What goes through people that they dissociate so completely with doing the right thing? He doesn't know if he going to coach again. He loves baseball to his core. He got free college and even represented our country on the Olympic team. He is out there trying to teach kids about baseball and in a lot of ways, life. Yet to these "parents" if you can call them that, the paramount issue is not doing the right thing but doing the winning thing. Getting instant gratification, to hell with the costs.

Through it all, and I told him this, I feel it has been such a privilege to become his friend this year. He told me if he does come back he would take some stands to ensure some sanity. I think those would be good moves. I am so close to telling him that if he does come back to sign me on in whatever capacity he sees fit. I want to have this guys back.

I asked him how he kept his head up throughout this insane ordeal. He said he took a lot of comfort in his little boy and little girls love. His wife was always there for him. Told me there were some nights when he just talked with her from 2 to 5 a.m. I told him that I'm sure that helped a lot. At the worst point of it all, he told me that during his morning shave, he would look into the mirror and ask God, "Am I doing the right thing?" Some days he said the shaving cream would dry up before he shaved but he always came away with a shaved face and the knowledge that he was doing the right thing.

Everything is a metaphor for something else. How's that for vague? Maybe you don't need to shave your face, maybe you should consider it (sorry, couldn't resist), maybe you have a beard, I dunno. As you look into your grey, brown, green, hazel, blue,and any other combination thereof, are you doing the right thing? It's a good question to ask.

I think anything, and I mean anything in life is managable as long as you take responsibility for yourself and don't take on others problems and shortcomings. In the end, you are the beat and the melody and the composer of your lifes song. Make it a good one please. There are so many ears listening.