Decisions At A Crossroads

David's first full week of football practice ended Friday.  He had skipped nearly all of the weight-room sessions over the winter and spring, and due to church mission trips, SeaBase, Scout camp, and our annual summer trip to Vermont, he scarcely participated in any of the summer ones.  So he reported to combine on August 2 without much training or effort having been put in all year.

To his credit, he is not whinging about how tired he is, or how much it hurts, or anything I might have expected.  He spent his first full week of practice doing whatever the coaches asked him to do; it appears they had put him in the pile of boys who they were looking at as possible wingbacks, and he dutifully began learning blocking schemes and plays with the six others (really? how many wingbacks does a team need!) who were similarly assigned.

However, my "this can't possibly go this smoothly" radar was correct: Friday he pulled his hamstring in practice.  Was it because he's so raw and unprepared for practices?  Possibly; but it's not like he was completely inert all summer (c.g.: Kleppinger, Sarah).  It's not a bad pull; he's quite mobile still, although a notable limp can be seen (especially when chores are to be done, but that's a different blog post).  However, the trainers have told him it'll be several days, maybe even a week or more, before they'll clear him to return.  He said one of the coaches, apparently somehow aware of the fact that Mary and Sarah were going to the beach later this month, gave him a nudge in that direction--"you might as well spend time with your family," or something like that--for an event still a week and a half away.  Hmmm.

I had thought that the rigors of the practices, and his lack of preparation this spring, might consign him to a second-string role; I had also commented privately that I would not be surprised to see him, come the beach week, weigh the costs of getting up every day at 6am for a decidedly minor role vs. the benefits of going to the beach, and "cut himself" from the no-cuts team.  I just hadn't thought of a hammy as the genesis for anything.

And so tonight is the annual intrasquad scrimmage for the Freshmen, in front of their parents; he obviously won't play, and now has chosen to skip going altogether, even to cheer on his squad.  Hmmm.  Will he get up Monday morning at 6am to go and stand on the sidelines for another three or four hours?  We'll see, but my intuition is that a camel's nose is under the tent.

He wants to play, he really does.  The fact that he's not allowed to, in my opinion, really does bother him: he wants to get out there and show coach what he's capable of doing.  I can almost see the tug of war going on in his heart and mind over what to do next; what happens the rest of this summer could be a real bellwether event for him, much as the 1987 College Republican National Convention was for me (don't ask).  I only know that I can't make up his mind for him, nor should I, as the young man struggles towards his own path in his own way.