Spend any amount of time in the pursuit of the sporting life and inevitably you will find yourself face to face with injury. This becomes more obvious as you motor down the road to decrepitude. Most notably when you can’t get out of bed because your body vociferously objects.
Very disappointing!
Nonetheless we endeavor to persevere, somehow exhuming ourselves from our comfy-comfy beds and out onto the playing field for another round of self-inflicted joy (hopefully). To this I add my own inspirational story.
For reasons I can’t adequately explain, I continue to play baseball, and have for the past 20 plus years. In that time I have injured my hands, wrists, shoulders, shins, thighs, hamstrings, ankles, feet, and toes. I’ve worn out one knee, requiring its being replaced (its own harrowing tale), and am probably wearing out the other. I’ve had my lip split by an errant throw running to first base, and hyperextended legs muscles after catching a cleat on the edge of home plate.
So far, so good.
At some point, a rational person would recognize the folly of it all and call it a day. I have known many a person such as this. They are, it must be said, braver and smarter than I. Yet I continue down that base-path to what can only be my personal doom.
I choose this with an affectation bordering on the delusional, but such is life. I shall also continue to improve even though that makes absolutely no sense. Growing older inevitably slows me, weakens me, and makes me less of a Greek god (though we all know I was never one to begin with). That does not mean I won’t continues to spend time in the batting cage working on my swing, going to practice in order to mitigate the ongoing treachery growing old has in mind concerning my had-eye coordination, and working on my pitching in the insane hope that somehow, someway I can once again throw a ball with staggering velocity.
A man can dream.
To all this one might ask the question: why?
Indeed. a fine question. One directed not just at me and my ilk, but of duffers, tennis aficionados, runners (right?), bridge players, and those engaged in any of those activities that we extoll in the young yet pish-posh in those who pursue it into old age. A question that calls for much chin rubbing and anguished, or for many smirking, deliberations on why we subject our bodies to such exertion when we can simply sit back and watch others who are in their prime? The answer is quite obvious:
Why not?
©2021 David William Pearce
David William Pearce, Writer 