Trey Smith
After my alma mater won the NCAA Division II Football Championship yesterday, I spent the rest of the day with a big smile planted on my face! While an old alum like me was proud to be a Pitt State Gorilla, I had nothing to do with the big win. My joy comes from a vicarious pleasure.
So, this got me to thinking about the members of the football team -- those lads who worked so hard to get to the title game. After all their sweat and toil, I wonder if the big win represents something of a letdown. I mean, you work all year to get to this point and, once you obtain it, then what? One can only dance around shouting, "We're #1" for so long. After awhile, you've got to get on with life.
As a child, Christmas Day was a big deal. My whole year was focused on this one day. My brother and I would clamor downstairs at the crack of dawn in the great anticipation of opening our presents under the tree (as well as all the other trappings and protocols that came with Christmas Day in my family). We'd tear off the wrapping paper to find that Santa had bowed to our wishes for that year.
"Look, it's the doodad I've been bugging my parents to get me all year!" We were so pleased. With our new toys, books and what nots tucked under our arms, we would disappear upstairs to marvel at this year's "haul."
But, in no time at all, a sort of depression set in. After targeting this one day for months and months, it was over with. Half of the crap we had wanted so badly turned out to be just that -- crap. It got tossed in a closet or a drawer never to be seen again!
In many ways, Christmas Day morning turned out to be anti-climatic. There was no way it could live up to the hype we had created in our minds. No matter what "we got for Christmas," it was never as wonderful as we thought it would be.
It is in this same vein that I wonder how the football team members feel today. For the seniors, yesterday was their last game. Win, lose or draw, most of them will never play a game of football again. The rest of them need to start getting ready for next term's classes.
It's great to achieve an objective or to realize a dream, but life goes on.
No expectations, no regrets.
ReplyDeletePerosnally, I don't remember any sort of "depression" after a delightful Christmas. It was simple joy, and in my memory, less about the material (although the year I got my first Big Bike was awesome) than a panoply of pleasures...food, music, visits, snowplay, lights. Celebration. That is the joy parents want to pass to their children (if they experienced it temselves), but it must be remembered that it is not the things, but the giving, the sharing, wherein is the joy.