Iron Sharpens Iron, So One Person Sharpens Another
The striking rays of the flood lights were illuminating the field, the high intensity artificial beams shining on the unfolding scene. The shouts of both teams trying to effectively communicate a strategic attack were distinguishably shrill. My appearance and those around me were covered with glistening skin and covered in constant drips of a smelly sticky substance running down each one of our faces. With a little more than half of the game already in history, it seemed as if we were going to war with an unyielding uphill incline with absolutely no sight of a summit. The score was one to nine with my team trying miserably to make an effort to continue going through the motions. As the team captain, I was optimistically trying to find the route to a miracle of a comeback, but my team was rapidly losing all sense hope.
As I hit the floor I immediately tried to get back to my feet and make an attempt to head in the direction of my coaches. At the time I was in deep shock and had no idea if the opposing team had scored or not. A split second later after all the adrenaline had drained from my body, I was able to distinctively identify a sharp piercing agony. I took a couple wobbly unstable steps before I felt a throbbing excruciating pain that was heavily arising second by second. I instantly hit the floor like a magnet for the second time and impulsively curled up in the fetal position thinking it would help ease my discomfort.
The San Diego Cavers were confidently playing games and toying with my defense. An offensive player on the opposing team attracted one of my long sticks by baiting him with the ball. I shouted for him to not over pursue but he cluelessly decided to anyways as if there was a delicious treat attached to the end of it calling his name. Before I could communicate with the rest of my defense on what man to guard and what to be aware for, the Cavers were already throwing the ball around searching for the opening they had created by luring one of our defenders out of his coverage. A few quick seconds later they had a shooter running up into the prepared hole to make an effort and score on our weak goal. Although my long sticks can sometimes make terrible decisions, they saw the shooter coming before he was able to reach the shooting zone. There was one problem, nobody communicated, and I had three defenders sprinting to the shooter attempting to prevent the shot that we all knew was coming. With half my defense scrambling to repair the previous situation, it created even more issues. At this moment in the game, there were countless holes in our defense that the Cavers preemptively were knowledgeable about and made one hell of an attempt to try and use this to their advantage. Unfortunately, we fell head over heels directly into their strategic trap. There were multiple players on the opposing team wide open with half my defense in an intense pursuit for the ball carrier. I hastily sprinted over to cover the nearest open attacker which coincidently ended up receiving the pass. I swiftly gave him a brutal stick check with my 6ft long pole. He seemed to scare from the pressure and intimidation of me pressing him and passed the ball to another wide-open shooter. During the midst of all the chaos, the wide-open shooter that was within inches of our goal was speedily covered by two of my defenders along with our goalie who for some unknown reason, stepped out of the cage. As I slipped back into my coverage, I could sense the shot coming. I started sprinting towards my man to provide coverage and in the corner of my eye I witnessed that the ball carrier had out worked and crossed both of my defenders and was loading up his shot. As the ball flew loose from his lacrosse net, I instinctively dove in front of the goal and made a full-fledged attempted to block the velocity of a 90-mph shot with my body. After abruptly landing on the rough artificial turf, I was unable to identify if I had blocked the shot or not and I was completely oblivious to what exactly just happened. My entire body was tingling with adrenaline and rushing with passion but after all that had faded away, I felt the most miserable pain in my entire life. Shrieking out in agony I had no idea what to do but hold the region that was throbbing with sweltering pain. The warm sensation surrounding my figure from me persistently giving every ounce of myself had instantly diminished and turned into a freezing cold bone chilling sweat. Goosebumps covered my entire body and It was in that very moment I had realized that I blocked the momentum of a 90-mph rubber lacrosse ball with one of the most delicate parts of my body. The torturing stinging was stemming from my groin area. After multiple attempts to try and get to my feet, I decided to just curl up in a ball and wait for the support of my coaches.
While diving in front of the goal I had only one mission, and that was to stop the unceasing relentless scores on our goal by the opposing team. I had made a firm pact with myself and with my teammates that they were unaware of. I pledged that I was going to work harder than any athlete on that field and I upheld that mental declaration physically loud and crystal clear.
“Woah, slow down Nate, take it easy there’s no rush” softly said the school athletic trainer after I made another failed attempted to return to my feet. Suddenly, all my coach’s faces were huddled around me. They were all at a loss for words and most of them didn’t have much to say but represent emotions of laughter that were not very well hidden. “I don’t know what you were thinking, but you sure did block that shot” praised coach Ian. I had no response but the echoes of my pain and distress, seconds later my head coach chimed in “You are crazy dude”.
Squirming on the floor in pain I softly said, “Is this what it feels like to get circumcised”? Everyone huddled around me that was looking for an excuse to laugh at the situation, fell a part in laughter. I didn’t know how else to respond to the unwanted attention of me getting injured besides to add humor to the situation to make it seem as if my injury wasn’t to serious. I took a good deep glance around the environment to reevaluate what had just occurred and why I was in so much pain. I was still gradually taking my time to reshape my mentality to fit the circumstance and endure the pain. I noticed that the unending battle we were endlessly combatting had seemed to be frozen in time. Every player that was on the field was resting on one knee in hopes to grant me their blessing and show respect to my painful wound. As I turned my head to the left, I noticed a few of my teammates were holding hands to try and ease their discomfort for me. I observed that the game clock had been paused and was no longer boundlessly ticking away at the minutes to this exhausting battle. I looked up at the sky and saw the flood lights beaming down on the surrounding area, but I was sheltered by the shadows of my coaches clustered around me. No matter where I looked, I could not avoid eye contact with the people in the surrounding area. After countless attempts on my own, I was able to swallow my pride and use the stabilization of my coaches to quiver off to the sideline while listening to the cheers of the entire stadium for me being able to stand to my feet. Although the pain was viciously tormenting, I was determinedly trying so hard to endure its inclining pace and not allow it to be represented through my body language. I was determined to not let my teammates or even my coaches to know how much discomfort I was truly in. My concern to not let the pain be represented was more alarming to me than my attention seeking injury. While aiding the arising agony with a frosty ice bag, I unconsciously had a vague voice in the back of my head.
You got to get up! You still have some left in the tank! Your teammates need you!. It was almost as if the voice in my mind was on a mental loop that was competing with the screaming thoughts of pain. I constantly clashed with both distinctive voices in my head, one that was motivating me to get back in the game and the other that was physically screeching for help.
I felt as if there was a devil and an angel whispering both of their perspectives of what I should do into each end of my ear. I eternally fought the continuously increasing pain and wrestled with both voices in my dome influencing me on what I should do next. After sitting on the bench for a few minutes and contemplating my next step, I decided to tune into the voice that was urging me to go back out on the field. I soon became more driven to get back in the game and the intolerable pain soon became tolerable. I hurled the chilling sack on the warm green turf and without hesitating, I rose to my feet. I took a couple of heavy steps toward the direction of our allied players on the sideline that were supportively shouting at the obstacles the game produced. After following along with the chaos by yelling plays and formations that were in sync with my team, the athletic trainer came over to me and said, “Nate, you should be taking it easy. When you ate that shot, I winced for you.” I responded to her with a small giggle and said, “Yeah it was painful in the moment, but I’m good now!” She replied, “Well from what I witnessed it looked extremely painful.”
I was at an absolute loss for words because to be truthfully honest, she was right. It was unimaginable how much agonizing pain I was in and still currently am in just standing up. In that moment my stinging ache started to increase once again. I had no clue how to respond but impulsively join in with my team yelling out calls to try and make our players aware of an attack the Cavers were trying to initiate. She soon became mindful of how attached I was to the game and within a short period of time, strolled off back to her golf cart. By the beginning of the 4th quarter it was torture witnessing how depleted and drained out my team was. Every instinct was telling me that I needed to be by their side to help them get through the rest of the vicious battle, but the only thing that was stopping me was my coach. I repetitively asked my defensive coach numerous times to be subbed back in the game, but his response ever time was either a death glare with his head turned to the side a little. With the urge to be subbed back, I walked over to my coach and said, “I need to go back in coach Nate”. “You’re injured dude, I don’t know if that’s the best idea”.
“I know sir, but I am fine now. All I needed was some ice”. An important sequence was initiated in the game and he completely disregarded my rebuttal. I waited a few minutes and then was compelled by the raging fire of passion inside of me to go ask him again. “Coach, I don’t think you understand, I need to go back out on the field”! “Give it some time Nate, we don’t want you prolonging your injury.” “I’m fine coach, we are getting killed out there. You got to sub me in, so I can aid our team.” No response from him. I understood to an extent, that they didn’t want one of their star players possible being executed for the rest of the season, but at the same time he had no clue how fierce the fire inside of me was ragging and the only thing that could attempt to suppress that fire was me finishing out the game like I did every other time. I knew that I couldn’t take no for an answer, I had to somehow get back out there and aid my depleted teammates. I continued to pester my defense coach and said, “Coach, the game isn’t letting up. I need to support my defense”. “Look dude, I don’t know what to tell you, go ask coach Ian”.
I confidentially limped over to our offensive coach and said, “You got to sub me back in coach, coach Nate told me to run it by you” Coach Ian said, “Dawg, you took a shot to the groin, I think its best if you rest up for the remaining quarter of the game”. “no sir” I said. “You don’t understand, just like coach Nate doesn’t understand. I must go back out there and help our team.”
Silence is all that came in attempt to get them to comprehend my reasoning. In result of me pestering all three of our coaches with the same question relentlessly, one of my coach’s final threw in the towel. Our defensive coach made the call and yelled out the name of our second string to return to the sideline. The pain was still existent, but my desire to be out there and support my teammates was irresistible and trumped over any thoughts of my injury. With less than 2 minutes left in the 4th quarter, coach Nate slapped me on my shoulders and hesitantly said “go get em”. Sprinting out into my coverage with a shining smile on my face, I was greeted by our right defender “Glad to see your walking bro”! My left defender said, “good to have you back, we need you man!” “Thanks guys but I couldn’t just watch you guys get destroyed”.
In that moment I knew I fought my selfish thoughts for the right reasons. I shared a laugh with my defense before being snapped back into the game by the squealing sound of the whistle being blown to initiate the return of the game. To me it wasn’t about winning or losing the game or even me getting hurt. It was about me going out on that field and giving every last bit of fight I had left in my tank. It was about me standing reliably sturdy by my team’s side and constantly going to war with them to lose a game we fought so hard for. In all honesty, that is what it was all about.
