45 Not Out

While my blog trawls the subjects of youth ministry, spirituality, pop culture and my own passions its not often [just very occasionally] that its about my deepest stuff... more an exploration to point to things I reckon are worth YOU the reader exploring for yourself!!

BUT today was my 45th birthday and we've just crossed into the day after!!
I reminisce...
I reminisce because I had a very significant birthday party to celebrate my 25 Not Out and so it resonates, because I've had some time to myself today...
and because its one of those days when I have missed rugby union more than words can say!!

When I was 21 I had a nice small party amongst friends and family and not long after that entered the network and friendship circle, the leadership opportunity and the faith shaping group known as the Hunter UYF!!!!
For this reason and because a few years later I knew if I was to follow my calling into the ministry of Youth Worker it would take me away from Newcastle,
I decided to have a big birthday bash called '25 not out'...
It was a great night... somewhere between 150 and maybe 200 guests [a dry show] at a former nursing home in Mayfield in Necastle that friends of mine would make their community house...
A last minute panic that the noise would be too great for locals was blown away when we realised that with the double cavity federation brick style you couldn't hear a thing outside...
It was a lot of fun and a special time.... there's been a fair bit of water, chocolate, take away food and life experience pass under the bridge since then!!
Started relationships, broken relationships, new relationships, kids, more Youth Worker jobs etc...
My eerie feeling that this party was well timed turned out to be true when I moved to Normanhurst to be Youth Worker six months later, then back home to the Hunter and now in the Synod role at least for two more years at this stage!!

I remember Robbie Carraro complaining all night about the 'dry' party... Steve Warham's counselling chair, U2 at full volume, and the huge crowd!!

Tonight I watched the story and the huge overreaction to the new All Black Haka and a story on the Footy Show about a young fella playing League who was burned in a car accident a few years back and lost most of his fingers and lots of hair...

I miss playing rugby union every week... its hard to describe... I loved the teamwork, the personal challenges, achieving success and moving into the senior player and coaches ranks...
alongside this I always struggled with weight, asthma and fitness [only truly fit to play in 1988, 89 1993, 4 and 5] Having done the hard work to get there I had a foot injury in January 1995 and never quite regained that edge [I also no longer lived alone near the beach and walked two or three times a day for 90mins flat out to keep that fitness]. Even 270 games and 22 seasons leaves me wanting more... but knee trouble was always going to bring me undone...

Next comes food allergies in 2001, steroids to blunt the life threatening reactions and weakening my knee tendons. I snapped both in a tackle at Muswellbrook three years ago and after seven weeks in hospital after surgery I can walk but can't run... between numbness, weak muscles and the prominence of arthritis now that the knees are less strong!!

I would give anything for one more run on No2 Sportsground, just to say goodbye...
to give it away only to be phoned a couple of years later when the team is short to come down and help...
OR to join a team of over 35s for the World Golden Oldies in LA or Sydney or...
I haven't coached this year because I knew I wouldn't have the time [thats been true]... and this has added to the pain...
I now go to see the rugby tests or Super 14 in Sydney and its only "the game I used to play"... there was always something special about still having wet hair from the post game wash up or struggling with a cork or a sore ankle up and down the stadium stairs as you watched the elite do very well what you havd been trundling around attempting to do earlier that very day!!
Yep, my spirit is less vibrant for lack of this time... I fell down, disappointed and I grieve... still!!
People are dying for lack of food, being bombed and experiencing persecution simply because of their beliefs across our planet... my clear call is to stand alongside those people, to be a change agent in my community, to live according to a set of values exampled and taught by Jesus Christ... and yet I have th audacity to miss something that became the essence of the fun in my life for so many years... it all disappeared so quick you see... and is pretty final when you could face surgery and another six weeks in hopsital if you pushed it too far!!

I don't think I ever expected to be still playing at age 45, but in my last season I knew that the previous year had been very unfulfilling, that the coaches had given me short shrift even considering my poor fitness, and I had set myself the task of two more seasons, getting fitter and retiring on a high... indeed I was enjoying my season enough I was toying with cutting it one short and making that my last. Difference being, uninjured I would always have the option of a cameo game here and there or to come back and play if I missed it... I guess its the lack of choice that makes me sad!!

Wierdly my food allergies seem to have settled and so fruit and vegies are back on the agenda until of course I discover it was a false dawn [by having an anaphylactic reaction [choking to death]....
So there are less excuses for my ballooning weight [no allergy drugs, no limit on apples etc]
All I have to do now is make the time to walk and stop stuffing my face with my favourite all time snacks and who knows maybe my knees could stand a training session and one cameo "run on" at a home game [20mins on then sub out and enjoy a beverage]!!

Tell him he's dreaming!!

Getting my hair peroxided and/or playing a winter season of baseball with my brother and nephew weren't enough incentive to get 30kgs off yet this year... maybe boring stuff like avoiding diabetes, heart failure and embarrassment in public space seating or on airplanes might eventually motivate me!! Not to mention 40 wasted Mambo t-shirts... Wallaby supporters gear and a somehow way less bouyant boogie board than it used to be...

OK thats probably way too much information for the world to read.... now where are those hard and soft centred birthday chocolates!!