Pardon me men for injecting a personal old timer's story, but perhaps it relates to the above opinions regarding BS's decision to play (or not), a most personal one for him with having his own family now. At the UVA game this past year the Football Alumni under Coach Baylock's direction were gathered together, as they are every once(or twice?, my first time), a season to go down on the field as the team runs out. We meet at one of the gate entrances, try to put the faces with the names and go down on the field. One of my teammates, a soft spoken slightly limping tall defensive lineman with arms down to his knees, I have'nt seen in 44 years.... We stood together there, on the playing field, silent. I watched as he looked up and around, not at the stadium that rose above us, but the blue sky above that stadium, and he spoke to me, (at least I believe it was directed to me), "You know, it feels right to have this field beneath our feet again..." Now, they say "the poet's job is to express the inexpressible..." I may not be able to express it properly, but I felt I knew exactly what he meant at that moment. It wasn't about "Glory Days" or some exaggerated youthful memory of Living in the Past, but our individual long ago selves, when we were boys blessed with youthful healthy vigor growing into men, playing a team game with fellow travelers that led us out unto the Green Fields and Blue October New England Skies, Muddy Fields and Grey Skies, Windy and Cold, Freezing and Sweat, Victory & Defeat. We were Alive with a purpose of fulfilling our spirits in a way. "This field beneath our feet...", was not just our respective college fields, but the local high school fields where we went after, or before, our summer jobs, mostly alone or with a few friends or fellow local players, the sweat dripping off the back of your neck, running alone, crossing midfield, bursting your lungs, feeling your legs like you would never feel them again. Lord knows many a young man, myself..., has born the weight of the axiom, "Youth is Wasted on the Young...", but most players of the game, whether it be the Big East, AAC or Yankee Conference, or that Last High School game..., as they come upon their last season, last game..., whatever else they may be blind to, it comes upon them, and they grasp it with all their inner and outer being and realize how fleeting it all was... Perhaps Bryant Shirreffs is contemplating that now.... "One More Season..., Just one More..., Before I Leave and Never Return...."
