Let me take you back to 1973. I was 9 years old and I had just spent the fall watching the Notre Dame football high light show on Sunday mornings before I went to church. I can still hear the late Lindsay Nelson’s voice say, “And now to further action.”
It was a Saturday afternoon in the Spring of 1973. My father had taken me and several of my friends to swim at the Greensboro Central YMCA. As we were leaving, the TV in the lobby was playing the UCLA vs. Notre Dame basketball game. My dad said, “we might want to stop and watch the end of this game. Notre Dame just might upset UCLA.” The UCLA Bruins had won 88 straight basketball games. And this my friends, was how my sports marriage to Notre Dame sports was born during the last ten minutes of that game. Screaming and cheering wildly at the TV in the lobby, my father could only chuckle or note to passersby, “Do these kids not have parents?”
When Notre Dame won that afternoon, I must have practiced throwing the ball in the air like John Shumate 10000 times. I wanted to die my socks Green and Yellow. I asked for Green carnations for my lapel for Sunday Church. I quietly aspired for my nick name to be Digger.Like a smoldering volcano, my love for all things ND lay dormant for many years.
There was no request for conversion to Catholicism. No, special requests for the pope. And I promise you there were many things to go to confession over but to this day they stay locked in the vault.I suffered under the Gerry Faust years. I anguished when they ran off Digger and I cheered for a few years the acquisition of Lou Holtz. Lou Holtz came about in my college days and my roommates thought it would be funny to burn all the ND memorabilia off my door. That day stays in the vault.
I became a true ND fan. Pulling for basketball as well as football. In the advent of the internet even looking at baseball, hockey, women’s basketball, etc. Could I name my first born Muffet? Then the movie Rudy came out and I felt in some way that the script was for me. The music, the tradition, the culture, the aura of all things Notre Dame. Hard to believe that the small town southern Baptist bred wished he was born red headed with the last name of O’Shannon or something.
Today I am a 44 year old man with one hobby; Notre Dame. I don’t ask for much but please let me see my football games every Saturday and the occasional basketball game.
As I reflect, I almost broke off the engagement to my wife, for during the national championship year of 1988, she made me go to dinner with her parents [promising to tape the USC vs. ND game.] Later that evening as we returned for the evening my future brother in law met me at the door screaming the results of the game. “I am sorry April, but the wedding is over! Oh, and I have to kill your brother Joe.”
We play Southern Cal on today. I hope we keep it under 45 points. It is usually not pretty but you have to love them during the tough times. Love hopes all things and endures all things. Love never fails.
Go Irish!
October 17, 2009
September 26, 2009
September 9, 2009
That Parkway Feeling
I spent Labor Day weekend on the Blue Ridge Parkway.
It is amazing watching the sun rise up slowly over Buffalo Mountain. Buffalo Mountain in Virginia got its name because it looks like the hump on a buffalo. Young sons would go off hunting with instructions from their mothers that if they can’t see Buffalo Mountain, they have gone too far.
It is amazing watching the sun rise up slowly over Buffalo Mountain. Buffalo Mountain in Virginia got its name because it looks like the hump on a buffalo. Young sons would go off hunting with instructions from their mothers that if they can’t see Buffalo Mountain, they have gone too far.
There seems to be a 50 mile stretch of the parkway where you get several views of the Buffalo.
Saturday, I rode my bike on the parkway. The scenery is so spectacular that you don’t mind the hills. It is hard not to feel close to God when you see the sights and sounds from the mountains. I think it is funny how we often feel closest to God when we are in the mountains or at the beach. Spectacular vistas, wonderful aromas and a certain amount of peace in being away from the hectic every day grind of our life. This allows for us to be drawn in to the quiet that brings us closer to God.
Why can’t we find that quiet in our daily lives? I imagine that we have too many obstacles back home. The grind of our daily lives and the pulls of home and work are too much to overcome. Someday soon, when you are taking kids to school and hustling to work, you need to ask yourself:
“ How are you going to find that parkway feeling?”
“ How are you going to find that parkway feeling?”
August 26, 2009
Conditioning
Brooks is going to play football for the first time. He is a big guy and is athletic so he should be good. But he has never had a coach really get on him. The first time a coach yells at him, maybe even grabs a little face mask, Brooks may want to quit. He is sensitive like his mother. I am worried that he has never been through the physical nature of football training. I keep encouraging him to start working out now, but his efforts have been half-hearted.
He and I played golf the other day, and we both were playing awful. You know how it is, some days you just can’t seem to hit anything where you want it. He wanted to quit. I kept encouraging him to fight through it; to be positive; to work hard at correcting mistakes. “Don’t just swing harder. Think through what you need to do.” But he would have nothing of it. He checked out mentally.
Consider the mental toughness required to make a 6 foot putt with a championship on the line, to complete a run or race in a personal record time, to make a difficult personnel decision, to give a closing argument, to perform a delicate surgery or to drive cross country by yourself! Each of these examples requires different conditioning. To be successful you have to practice the physical act and the mental and emotional act.
Success takes physical, mental and spiritual conditioning. Diet, exercise and drills can only take us so far. I have worked with so many talented people but they didn’t know how to take care of themselves and condition themselves with habits that lead to success. They had all of the innate skills to be a solid leader, but they would get distracted by…..well just call it immaturity.
Physical exercise has some value, but spiritual exercise is much more important, for it promises reward in both this life and the next. 1 Timothy 4:8
Commit yourself to staying fit physically, mentally and spiritually. You should desire to get in the best condition of your life, to use your time wisely and to have the desire to reach your goals. Spirit, Mind and Body - the Y way!!!!
Consider the mental toughness required to make a 6 foot putt with a championship on the line, to complete a run or race in a personal record time, to make a difficult personnel decision, to give a closing argument, to perform a delicate surgery or to drive cross country by yourself! Each of these examples requires different conditioning. To be successful you have to practice the physical act and the mental and emotional act.
Success takes physical, mental and spiritual conditioning. Diet, exercise and drills can only take us so far. I have worked with so many talented people but they didn’t know how to take care of themselves and condition themselves with habits that lead to success. They had all of the innate skills to be a solid leader, but they would get distracted by…..well just call it immaturity.
Physical exercise has some value, but spiritual exercise is much more important, for it promises reward in both this life and the next. 1 Timothy 4:8
Commit yourself to staying fit physically, mentally and spiritually. You should desire to get in the best condition of your life, to use your time wisely and to have the desire to reach your goals. Spirit, Mind and Body - the Y way!!!!
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