There ought to be a Constitutional amendment outlawing the start of school until after Labor Day but, as is so often the case when I seek to right a wrong, theres no turning back now.
I might as well be calling for the repeal of laws banning smoking on airplanes.
Not happening.
But if you weigh 351 pounds and are as huge as an Airstream trailer and try to fit your fat self into an aisle seat meant for someone half your size, youre completely entitled to have your flab bleed over into the personal space of a guy trying to look out the window as the ground disappears.
Makes no sense.
Sure, cigarettes are dangerous, but sos inhaling 5,000 calories a day, growing so obese that you couldnt outrun a turtle in a wheelchair.
But thats the world today.
Id rather think of yesterday.
Which brings us back to high school.
As I recall, it was a minefield, surrounded by a gator-infested moat, enclosed by a 20-foot high fence topped with vicious coils of razor wire that would have deterred even the Manson Family zealots as they creepy-crawled their way into infamy.
In short, a prison without once-a-month visits from loved ones.
But thats just me.
A lot of kids loved high school and thats perfectly fine; in fact, thats where were headed right now, down the street and up the path to the seat of learning where your personality, whether you realize it or not, was forged in the crucible of adolescence.
It helped, of course, if you were an athlete.
Whats the Olympic motto?
Something like, Stronger ... Faster ... Higher?
Whatever.
I grew up in a small Ohio town and Friday night football ran second only to Sunday morning church. It was required and I had no problem with that.
Actually, there was something comforting about sitting in the grandstand, not having to do anything except watch.
SURE, I PLAYED FOOTBALL, but it was of the sandlot variety, just us guys letting off steam. Wed play pickup games anywhere we could find a stretch of grass wide enough and long enough to contain our enthusiasm for contact.
Nosebleeds were common, as were ankle and wrist sprains, but, over the course of four years, I cant recall anyone requiring stitches or crutches.
But on Football Fridays, there was always an ambulance parked just outside the end zone, which was kind of scary.
Guys that youd shared gym class with, guys who walked the same hallways, guys whod decided to take the stage ... they could have been hurt real bad.
And thats the thing.
They chose to represent our town and, in so doing, put their limbs on the line.
Ive never once in my life dressed myself in full football regalia, the pads and helmet, tugged on a jersey and trotted onto the field in front of thousands, bathed in lights that could be seen out on Route 42.
But there were always guys who said, Yes, sir, when the coach blew that practice whistle and demanded that they do 20 pushups or run 10 laps for some kind of infraction.
You have to respect that kind of dedication.
And it wasnt like they were an alien species. Athletes were high school kids, just as messed up and lost as those of us who stayed on the sidelines. Id recommend renting or downloading Dazed and Confused if I werent pretty sure most of you, loyal readers, hadnt already memorized it.
They took a step that most didnt. They looked at Football Fridays as a chance to have fun.
You gotta love that.
As Ive said, high school was a simmering vat of conundrum-laden opportunity and only the strongest of character stepped into the limelight.
Me?
Forget it.
I was pretty good as wide receiver when it was five-on-five or seven-on-seven, but that huge stage wasnt my bailiwick.
I was awfully good, however, as an observer of what transpired on those Football Fridays, which led me to my first gig as a professional writer.
THE NOTRE DAME FIGHT SONG is traditionally ranked as the most identifiable of them all. Arguments are always made for Michigan and Ohio State and Southern Cal, but when the rubber hits the road, its Cheer. cheer for old Notre Dame thats the leader of the pack.
Which is as it should be.
Well, thats just my opinion but, even before I became a graduate of that university, it was the only one I could sing, start to finish, and I was the first-born son of a couple of OSU grads.
So, when I was hired to write stories about high school football games -- at a flat rate, not hourly -- I was only a couple of months removed from South Bend and all that it had meant to me.
Imagine my surprise when, on the first Football Friday of my professional career, watching a game from a press box overlooking a field surrounded by cornfields, I heard the marching band -- maybe 25 strong -- strike up my alma maters fight song.
It was surreal.
It was transcendent.
It was crazy.
Cheer, cheer for old blank-blank High, it went and I just shook my head. Twenty-two years old, working my first Football Friday game and the song I heard took me back to a place I thought Id left behind.
Felt like Bogart in Casablanca.
Of all the gin joints in all the world, she walks into mine.
Speaking of pretty and talented women -- as Ingrid Bergman certainly was -- my high school offered several outlets for those of the fairer sex to be part of the fall festivities.
They could be members of the band, as my sister was.
They could be members of the dance team, as a couple of my girlfriends were.
And they could be cheerleaders, the upper echelon.
When I went back to the office, that first Football Friday, to file my story on the game Id witnessed, I fired up the IBM Selectric and began typing. Then, as now, I was subject to distraction and there, on the desk at which I was writing, was a copy of the high school football preview edition from 1972, perhaps the most scandalous publication in my little towns history.
Cheerleaders from my high school were pictured, holding footballs, wearing only bikinis.
I was transfixed, unable to write. I looked at my boss.
I know these girls, I said. Not personally, but I know who they are. Or were.
Best-selling edition we ever put out, he said.
Now, all these years later, I can place those ladies in homerooms and study halls and chemistry class. They were just like the rest of us, trying their best to fit into the fall sports continuum.
Oh, yeah.
And I think that football team went almost undefeated.
