Life again

I'm all out of sorts. I regret having missed working the Super Bowl and I'm tired for no reason other than my own emotions are gone having expended them on the Saints.

I awoke this morning concerned about contracts and wondering who the first opponent is next season. I'm losing my mind, I fear.

What should be the happiest time of my life is the happiest time of my life, with reservations. Maybe that's the half-filled life I lead. It's never enough. I didn't fit in with the crowd in the Quarter Sunday night, discovering I'm too straight, too old, too alcohol-less, too smoke-less and too, well, cranky I guess.

I discovered I wasn't happy enough to share this victory. Had these young whipper snappers (another term in which I use but have no idea what it's meaning is) spent all those years changing clothes because one shirt worked better than the other during games? Had they spent all those years just waiting for a winning season? Had they...

The Bible talks about my feelings a bit.

In Matthew 21 from the Message we read:
33-34"Here's another story. Listen closely. There was once a man, a wealthy farmer, who planted a vineyard. He fenced it, dug a winepress, put up a watchtower, then turned it over to the farmhands and went off on a trip. When it was time to harvest the grapes, he sent his servants back to collect his profits.
35-37"The farmhands grabbed the first servant and beat him up. The next one they murdered. They threw stones at the third but he got away. The owner tried again, sending more servants. They got the same treatment. The owner was at the end of his rope. He decided to send his son. 'Surely,' he thought, 'they will respect my son.'

38-39"But when the farmhands saw the son arrive, they rubbed their hands in greed. 'This is the heir! Let's kill him and have it all for ourselves.' They grabbed him, threw him out, and killed him.

40"Now, when the owner of the vineyard arrives home from his trip, what do you think he will do to the farmhands?"

41"He'll kill them—a rotten bunch, and good riddance," they answered. "Then he'll assign the vineyard to farmhands who will hand over the profits when it's time."

42-44Jesus said, "Right—and you can read it for yourselves in your Bibles:

The stone the masons threw out
is now the cornerstone.
This is God's work;
we rub our eyes, we can hardly believe it!
"This is the way it is with you. God's kingdom will be taken back from you and handed over to a people who will live out a kingdom life. Whoever stumbles on this Stone gets shattered; whoever the Stone falls on gets smashed."

I have no right to hoard my Saints, no right to deny others their own way of celebrating, no right to have second-thoughts about my own happiness. I have, basically, no rights.

Everything I am, I am by the grace of God. I will never be a sports writer again. I miss it terribly. But the fact is I've told God that whatever He wants from me, I will do.

The Saints have come.

Now is the time to go on.

(After the parade today)