Weekend Warriors · 15 March 2007
Weekend warriors are a funny breed. They sit on their buns all week long and then they play hard on the weekends. One-hundred percent. All out. Football, basketball, soccer, hockey, softball, mountain biking, and just about any other activity that they can relive glory days or just have some fun. Everybody knows who these weekend warriors are. They are the guys and gals who hobble back into work on Monday mornings popping aspirin like it was candy. During breaks, they are slouched back in their chairs with their forearms over their foreheads and covering their eyes groaning in the break room. I know who they are because I am one. Minus the aspirin. (I would rather suffer – as they say, “Pain just means you are alive.”)
Most of the guys I work and play with come back from our weekend forays into church league football and basketball spry and chipper. The first weekend of a new league, they are somewhat sore but they are young and in pretty good shape so they are never as sore as I am. This would be fine except that we work in a high school and so not just co-workers wonder where the limp came from but so do all the students.
A couple years ago, the students laughed on a Monday when I limped through the school and around my classroom. Some students asked what happened and why I was limping. I told them that I was playing flag football. A couple of the guys said that they thought I must have been playing tackle with the way I was hobbling and they laughed in my face because it was just flag football. I did not even argue with them; I was too sore.
This year, I came to school with a black eye on the Monday after our basketball league started. What actually happened was that I was going up for a rebound as a 6-foot 7- or 8-inch monster was coming down with the ball. My face happened to be in way of this former Dallas Cowboy’s elbow. I do not think that he even felt it even though I almost buckled from the force.
While the truth is the good story, the rumor is the great story. Naturally. The rumor is that my wife cold cocked me when I mouthed off to her. Surely, I crumpled to the floor and ended up with the black eye and a sore head from the fall. It is funny because almost to a person (staff and students alike), that is the story they come up with. I guess it makes a better story than just playing basketball.
Regardless of the stories (some of my students tell each other that I was in some fight and that they should see the other guy), I am glad that my being a weekend warrior can bring such hearty laughter and joy into the lives of my coworkers and students. I am happy to provide grist for the rumor mill and topics for discussion. I am glad that people can laugh at my misfortune. I just won’t tell them about how I pulled my hamstring playing softball one summer and hobbled around for a month.
© 2007 Michael T. Miyoshi
| Share on facebook | Tweet |
|
Published 15 March 2007 in The RiverCurrentNews
Commenting is closed for this article.
| Writing | How to Stay Healthy - Act Like a Child |