by Bert Carson
I’ll never forget the afternoon that he was cut from the freshman football team. It had been his first try at football and the first major failure of his life. He was so choked up it took some time for us to get the whole story out of him.
It finally came out. After only one week of practice, the coach had told him that he didn’t have the size, coordination, or the other basic skills needed to play football. Then, he suggested that Bobby give up any idea of sports and consider the band or the Chess Club. Bobby shook with frustration as he sat in the living room recalling the scene.
Slowly he raised his head, wiped at his nose with the back of his hand, looked at me and in a trembling voice said, “Daddy, he said all of that in the locker room with my friends standing around. Then he told me to clean out my locker, and he walked off.” The memory of that final insult was too much. He sobbed and dropped his head into his hands.
Kathy moved to his side and held him with both arms, as he sobbed. I tightened my hands on the arms of my chair to keep from jumping up. I felt the blood drain from my face and then rush back. The vein above my right eye throbbed and my gaze went icy. Kathy told me later that it was like watching Dr. Jekyll become Mr. Hyde. She looked at me over Bobby’s head, and shook her head slowly, discouraging my rage.
I began to make an effort to relax and let it go. I wasn’t upset about the coach’s decision so much as with the way he had confronted Bobby in front of other players. The coach and I were in much the same position. On occasion, I had to tell an aspiring young pilot that he didn’t have what it took to fly, but when that was necessary, my first consideration was always for the student’s feelings. I would never take that action in the callous manner the coach had used with Bobby.
As I looked at Kathy and Bobby my anger began to fade in the light of a plan. A plan I had used successfully with some struggling student pilots. “Bobby, do you want to play football or is it just a whim?” I asked.
It took him a moment to gather the composure to answer. Finally, he choked out a response, “Daddy, I want to play football more than anything else. I don’t know why, I just know I want to do it.”
I knew there was more so I waited for him to continue. Finally, he said, “Daddy, I know I don’t have any experience. Some of the kids on the team have been playing football for years. And I know I’m not as big as most of the other guys, but I can learn to play. There are guys smaller than me on the team. I want to play!”
I chose my words carefully, knowing that what I was about to say would mean a serious commitment on both our parts. “If you’re sure you want to play, here’s what we’ll do. We’ll practice every day after school, just the two of us. It’s been years since I played, and then it was only sandlot football, but what I don’t know, I can learn and so can you. It won’t be easy and it’s going to take time, a lot of time. There isn’t any way you can make the freshman team, and maybe you won’t be ready next year, which will only make it harder to make the team when you are ready. But, if you want to play football, and you’re willing to work at it, I’ll help you.”
Chapter 6
Bobby’s eyes began to sparkle through the tears. “Do you mean it, Daddy? It will take a lot of time but if you’ll help me, I can do it, I know I can. You can count on me. I’ll do it. I’ll practice every day and I’ll always do the very best that I can. You’ll see...” The words spilled out so fast they ran together, finally ending when he ran out of breath.
Out of corner of my eye I saw Kathy smile as I said, “That’s good enough for me, Son, but I want you to understand that no matter how hard we work, there’s no guarantee that you’ll make the team.”
“I understand that, Daddy. But I know I can make it, if I just have half a chance…can we start tomorrow?” He jumped up and began moving from the room before I could reply.
“Might as well,” I called after him.
“Thanks, Daddy,” Bobby shouted from the hallway, just before he sprinted away toward his room.
Kathy looked at me and shook her head. With a half-smile on her lips she said, “Well, I guess boys will be boys and Josh Edwards you are the oldest little boy of them all.” A little more seriously, she asked, “Don’t you think you might be overdoing it some? I understand the running, but a forty-one year old man taking up football…” She left the remark hanging unfinished, in the air.
“Hey, thanks to running I’m in such good condition I can handle anything. Besides, George Blanda was playing professional football ball when he was forty-six.”
In reply, she arched her eyebrows, giggled, and said, “Okay, Superman, I’ll remind you of that later, and just in case you’ve forgotten, you are Josh Edwards, not George Blanda.”
********
The following day we began throwing a football back and forth across the vacant lot next door. That night and countless others we spent studying; first the skills needed at various positions, then the art of play execution and offensive and defensive strategy. Without intending to, we became both players and students of the game. We worked at it every day, seven days a week, regardless of the weather. I never pushed Bobby to practice. I didn’t have to, he was always ready, locked onto his goal like a storm tossed sailor gazing at a lighthouse.
We determined that Bobby’s combination of speed, weight, and height made him a natural wide receiver or possibly a defensive back. Since he had large sure hands, we began to concentrate on the receiver position. As a backup plan, we explored the possibility of kicking, even though Bobby didn’t consider kicking actually playing the game.
I quickly realized there was a lot more to football than I ever knew as a sandlot player or TV spectator. And, I found that being a runner didn’t automatically qualify me to play football. A week or so after we began our practice sessions, I bought two sets of weights and two weight benches and we added weight lifting to our workouts.
Instead of reminding me of her original comment, Kathy offered encouragement and liniment, not always in that order. On one hand, the project demanded much of all three of us. On the other, it made us stronger, as individuals and as a family. As far as football was concerned, the payoff didn’t come for two years, two years of practicing at least ten hours a week, every week.
When tryouts came a month before he started his sophomore year, Bobby knew he wasn’t ready. Twelve months later, Bobby felt confident to try out again. At dinner, he told us about his conversation with the coach.
“I talked to the coach today and explained that I’d been working for almost two years. He took a look at me and said, ‘Well, Edwards, you’re taller now, but you aren’t much heavier. I’ll give you another chance, but don’t hold your breath. What position do you think you can play?’”
I told him that I was a receiver and he said, “That’s wonderful. I have receivers coming out of my ears. I’ll let you try out, but if that’s all you can do, you don’t have much of a chance of making this team.”
A slim chance was all that Bobby needed. He didn’t know that I secretly watched his first practice session from the top row of the stadium. If he was nervous, he didn’t show it. He didn’t miss a single pass and he ran every pattern perfectly. I pretended to be surprised when he burst into the kitchen a week after practice began and announced to us and everyone else within a two-block radius that he had made the team. “It’s only second-string,” he continued with slightly less volume, “but it’s a start.”
When the season ended, Bobby’s total playing time was five quarters, but he had performed well and he was proud of himself. After the season, we resumed our daily practice sessions. The extra work didn’t make him a starter in his senior year either, but he played at least one quarter of every game, and he excelled.
Now, he believed he could play college ball. Maybe not on a scholarship and not at a major university, but he was confident he could play if he found the right school. He had been narrowing his search for that school when Kathy died. Her death brought his plans to a halt. Now I had an idea that I thought would
restart his search and our life together.
*******
I finished the run, stretched, removed my shoes and walked in the back door. I found Bobby sitting in the living room with the drapes drawn and the lights off. In the artificial darkness of the room, it was difficult to make out his face, but I knew the look that was there without seeing it. We had both worn the same half-alive, shocked look for the past two weeks.
“Hi, Bobby,” I called, as I passed the living room heading for the kitchen. I thought I heard a response to my greeting, but I wasn’t sure. As I opened the refrigerator and reached for the water bottle, I called out again, “How about a little football?” I drank slowly, listening for a response.
Instead of the usual loud, “All Right!” That I’d come to expect when I invited him to play football, I heard his slow footsteps moving toward the kitchen. He paused in the doorway and said, “I don’t feel like it today, Daddy.”
I replaced the water bottle in the refrigerator as I searched for the right words. Then I turned toward him, put both my hands on his shoulders, looked into his eyes and said softly, “I don’t feel like it either, Bobby, but I know we have to start living again. Your mother wouldn’t have wanted us dragging around like this. Life won’t be much fun without her, at least not for a longtime, but there is nothing we can do that’s going to change that. Let’s go and play football for a while. It can’t make us feel any worse.”
Bobby considered for a moment. Finally, he said, “Give me two minutes to change clothes.” A few minutes later, he returned with a football and we headed for the park a block from our house.
The first few minutes of play weren’t easy, but finally the old joy of playing together began to return and before either of us realized what was happening, we were caught up in a furious practice session. We played until dark, expelling all the pent-up energy of the past two weeks.
The previous four years had not only made Bobby a football player; they had turned me into more than a passable football technician. I punted the ball consistently more than forty yards, and fifty-yard field goals weren’t unusual.
I had fallen in love with the kicking game when we were considering it as an alternative for Bobby. Besides punting and placekicking, I had developed pinpoint accuracy as a passer in our work to hone Bobby’s receiving skills. In addition, the weight lifting had paid off in passing velocity and distance, not to mention the improvement it had made in my running, both in speed and endurance.
I had come to enjoy and look forward to our football practices and the work had rewarded us both with skills that we hadn’t dreamed of four years earlier.
For the first time in two weeks, we were free of the cloud of despair that had settled on us, at least for the moment.
Chapter 7
I don’t know whether darkness or exhaustion ended the practice session. In the twilight, we sprawled in the leaves at the base of a large oak tree on the edge of the playing field. I labored to catch my breath, after our final sprint across the field, the traditional end to all of our practice sessions.
Finally, with heart rate and respiration nearing normal, I looked at Bobby and said, “Son, I had an idea today while I was running, but before I tell you about it there’s something I need to say.” I paused, and then said, “I want you to know that more than anything in the world, I would have your mother back in our lives. There have been many times in the last two weeks when I wished it had been me rather than her. I don’t know why it wasn’t… but the fact is, no matter how much I want to change what has happened, or you want to change it, we can’t. Now the way I see it is all that we have left to do is live the best that we can. That’s what she would have expected and that’s what we have to do.”
My words hung in the air, as though waiting for a response. I turned my head toward Bobby. He was lying on his back, staring straight up into the limbs of the tree. In the fading light, I couldn’t see his eyes or make out the expression on his face. I turned my head away and joined him in staring upward. As I waited, I noted the new leafs that seemed to have appeared overnight.
When he spoke his voice was soft, and I could sense his tears through the darkness separating us, as I felt my own streaming down my cheeks.
“I know you’re right, Daddy…still, it’s hard. It is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, harder than learning to play football. Harder than anything…it seems like she is all I can think about, every minute of every day and when I finally get to sleep I dream about her.” His voice broke and then trailed away. I slid across the leaves to his side and put my arm around his shoulders and we both cried softly. Finally, we sat up, sniffled a bit as we regained our composure.
Then I said, “Here’s what came to me while I was running and you don’t have to say anything or decide right now. Just sleep on it, okay?”
Bobby nodded and I continued. “I’m pleased that you want to go to college. I haven’t thought much about it until now, but I know one reason I’m so pleased is that I never went. When I graduated from high school, I only had one thought, to marry your mother. I’ve never regretted that, but I’ve wondered what it would have been like to have gone to college. In fact, I always figured that someday I would go. That day never came. I had a lot of excuses. The main one was the Army. I know I’m being long-winded, but I want you to know that what I’m about to suggest is not just to soothe your feelings. It’s something I want to do for me, too. I had an even longer speech worked out in my head but the rest of it has gone away for now. What I’m getting at is, let’s find a college and go to school together.”
I let the last sentence hang between us. There was no response from Bobby. Finally, I couldn’t stand it any longer, “I know that I said I didn’t want an answer right now, but at least tell me what your first thought is.”
He didn’t say anything for what seemed like hours but was probably no more than ten seconds. Then he said, “Daddy, I don’t know what to say, but I know it’s a great idea! Maybe the best idea you’ve ever had, after asking mother to marry you, that is. Do you mean it?”
“Of course I mean it. When the idea came to me, I thought that it was silly and then I realized that it wasn’t silly and there was no reason not to do it. I’ve always wanted to go to college. My retirement is effective in two months, in fact, a week before you graduate. I would like to go to school and I want to be with you. There’s no reason in the world we can’t do it.”
His soft reply from the darkness was simply, “Wow.”
Encouraged, I continued, “That’s not all. Except for my tours in Vietnam, I’ve always lived in the Southeast. I love it and its home, but, we can go anywhere we want to go. Let’s move to a part of the country where we have never lived. That’s got to be the best way for us to make a new start.”
“That won’t be a problem for me. I knew I would have to leave town to go to college anyway, and I had just as soon live in another part of the country. Have you got a school in mind?”
“No, I haven’t got that far in my thinking, but I have an idea that it should be in the west. I did live in Texas for a few months, just before my second tour in Vietnam. It was all right, but I’d like to be somewhere in or near mountains, maybe in the northwest. I don’t know why, I just think I’d enjoy that. I don’t think either of us would like a large city and I know you want to play football. Let’s look for a small school, with a football team, in a medium sized city in the west or the northwest.”
“I don’t know where to start, Daddy.”
“Neither do I, Son, but I have an idea that we’ve already started, now all we have to do is decide where we are going.”
We gathered the football and our discarded shirts and began walking across the field. Bobby said, “Everything’s going to be all right now, Daddy…at least as all right as it can be…thanks.”
With arms around each other’s shoulders we walked home.
********
The pain and loneliness that filled us didn’t leave overnigh
t, but it began to fade with our decision to live again. We resumed our daily football practices with an intensity we hadn’t put into them in months. Within a couple of weeks, our skills and physical conditioning were sharper than ever. However, our search for a school was going nowhere, though we spent hours in the library going through countless catalogs and chamber of commerce brochures. We looked at schools in Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona and New Mexico.
“I don’t know, Daddy. Maybe there just isn’t a school that has everything we want. Why don’t we consider a bigger school or maybe staying in the South?” Bobby asked, after a fruitless evening at the library.
“I’ve thought about that, and I’m tempted, but for the past twenty-four years, I’ve not had a choice about where we lived. Now that I do, I don’t want to compromise. I want to have everything we want in a school. Let’s look some more, I know the right school is out there somewhere, we just haven’t found it yet.”
The search continued and expanded. We talked to friends, neighbors, and anyone else who would listen. All of our leads failed to pan out. I realized that to be accepted into the fall semester, we would have to decide soon. I was on the point of agreeing to a compromise when, late one Saturday afternoon, Bobby burst into the house, “I was in the garage throwing away old magazines when I found this!” he shouted. He slapped a copy of Outside Magazine, opened to an article on small colleges, in my lap. “Read about BowdoinCollege and Dartmouth!” he exclaimed.
“We didn’t’ consider the northeast,” I said as I scanned the portions of the article about Bowdoin and Dartmouth. “They both sound great. Let’s get their catalogs. What other schools does the article mention?”
“I don’t know. I got so excited reading about Bowdoin and Dartmouth that I didn’t finish it.” I quickly scanned the entire article, noting that it also mentioned the University of California, University of Colorado, and the University of Puget Sound, all of which we had looked into. In addition, the article discussed one other school that we’d not checked out.
