Tonight I went to a visitation for the mother of one of my former high school football coaches. I was somewhat surprised when he recognized me. It’s the start of the spring semester of 2015, 29 years after I graduated high school. It’s amazing to me that a man who coached hundreds, even thousands, of athletes over the years can remember the name and recognize the extremely aged face of a player who never played another down after his senior year in high school. Then I realized just how much this man must have cared for each and every one of his players over the years to recognize an old dog like me after almost 30 years. God has a way of getting our attention, and I think He did tonight for me. You see, it’s been a somewhat rough semester. For the first time in years, I honestly felt ineffective as a teacher. For the first time in years, I honestly considered looking for a job in a different field. Don’t get me wrong. I had a bunch of great kids, but I also had a bunch that I just couldn’t seem to get through to. I just couldn’t motivate them, and motivating kids is what I’m supposed to do. As the semester wore on, that wore on me more and more, finally leading me to believe that maybe I’d finished this race and it might be time to move on. Several things happened before tonight to convince me to stay and continue teaching, that I wasn’t quite as ineffective as I’d felt. But my visit tonight with my old coach went beyond that. He didn’t just recognize me. He was glad to see me. And on the way home, thoughts of those high school football days raced through my mind. That’s when I realized he must have felt the same why I have this semester countless times over his own career. How many times did he struggle to motivate kids? How many times did he consider another line of work? How many times did he wonder if the students he worked with were learning the lessons he tried to teach them? But he didn’t quit. He stuck it out and kept going. Tonight made me wonder if he and my other coaches ever wondered if I and my teammates were learning all the things they tried to teach us. There were lots of times they must have wondered, but they never quit on us. We weren’t terrible kids, but we certainly weren’t saints either. We were high strung teenage boys who thought we knew everything and were convinced we were invincible. We did lots of things we shouldn’t have, and took lots of chances we shouldn’t have. At the time, we were also convinced that our teachers and coaches and parents had no idea the things we were doing. But now, after 9 years of teaching, I realize how wrong we were. They knew what we were up to, and they had to worry and wonder if we were learning anything, let alone everything, they were trying to teach us. But they didn’t quit on us. They didn’t change professions. They kept teaching us. They kept pushing us. They kept driving us. They never gave up. My coaches were a big part, one of the biggest parts, of what made me who I am today. The lessons I learned from them taught me to be strong, tough, determined, disciplined, and persistent. I think about my teammates and I think they’d say the same. Black or white, rich or poor, we were all the same to them. Today, with few exceptions, these teammates and friends are great people. Good folks. Successful folks. Our coaches never gave up on us, even when they had to be shaking their heads and wondering if we’d ever live through our stupidity. They kept trying. They kept teaching. And a bunch of us are a lot better off because of their efforts. So thank you Coach Daniels, and all our other coaches, for caring so much for us, for putting up with more than you ever should have had to, and for never giving up on us. I can only hope that I can be as effective a teacher and coach as y’all have been.
Posted on: Fri, 09 Jan 2015 04:18:45 +0000
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