Do It For You

Do it for you. What the heck does that mean?

To me, it means that whatever you do, do it for you. Simple right?

Wrong,

My son is a freshmen in high school. He is a fantastic son, and not just because he is mine.

He is intelligent, funny, sweet, gentle, good to all his family, fun with his friends. He is an inspiration to me.

Oh yeah, he is a large guy.

Whenever anyone sees him, they ask if he plays football.

It is like, since you are big, you have to play. He is getting sick of hearing all this.

The other day he said, dad, I guess I am going out for football next year. I said, really, tell me why.

He said the freshmen high school coach came up to him that week and said he ought to play.

I said, if you want to go out, do it for you. I'll support you. But, if the only reason you are going out is so people don't bug you about football, then that is not a good enough reason.

I am not interested in having other people tell me what I should do, should get involved in and shouldn't do. No one should.

I never pushed him to go out for football.

I know all about it. I know how much time, effort and energy it takes.

I know that since he has never played, he will really be behind the other guys.

I never wanted him to play for the reasons I played.

I grew up in a small town. You basically had to play.

I will admit I liked it. It was fine for me. But I have gotten to a point in my life where I do not feel the need to do things just because people tell me I should do them.

It is only May now, so he and I have time to discuss it further.

One big reason that I have resisted all the attempts over the years to get him to play football is that he has asthma and I am terrified about that. I cannot be at all his practices. How can I be sure that he will be ok?

When I played, you had to do what the coaches said. No matter how tired you were you had to run. You had to push the blocking sleds. You had to do the calistenics. You had to run the plays.

Being in shape is needed to play the game. I am just not sure how a person with less than perfect breathing ability will be able to handle that. Maybe he would be fine. Maybe what I went through isn't the way it is now.

But, maybe it is. Maybe it is worse.

You know in the overall scheme of life, it will not matter if my son plays football or not. Football will be fine with him or without him.

What I want is for him to decide what he wants after fully understanding what is involved. Only do it for himself, not others.

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