Playing Soccer

So last week the gang unit came through on their annual visit.  Every man, stripped down to boxers, standing at the end of their bed to be examined (i.e. stared at) by gang unit members for telltale “tats” indicating your affiliation status and rank.  Like so many things in prison:  the strip searches (“lift you sac, squat and cough”), the urine testing with an officer so close observing you can feel his breath, you learn to shrug off the daily indignities and violations of your person hood.  After all, you’re an inmate.  You brought it on yourself; you have no rights.

The search ended and the rec yards reopened and the building soccer team needed to get ready for a game.  Big S – the team captain – came at me with Goat and Jordan.  “We need you.  None of our subs have any wind.  You run every day.”  I hemmed and hawed a bit then figured “what the hell”.

I found myself out on the soccer field chasing around a bunch of guys young enough to be my sons.  The oldest, Big S, is only 31.  Most of the team is 24 to 28.  I ran and kicked the ball and ran some more.  It was exhausting yes, liberating and fun.  Here I am 52 years old, and I’m playing a kids games with, well with kids my older son’s age.  I was drenched with sweat.  My legs ached.  Still, two hours running on the field felt amazing.

There are many days when I wonder “does any of this really matter?”  I ask myself what use my adult years have been.  Thirty years ago I had my life in front of me.   I had prestigious graduate and law schools wanting me.  My entire life was set out in my mind’s eye.  I took a different path.  I followed my heart and it didn’t end as I expected.  Bad choices (through good intentions) and I find myself alone in prison.

I think of Marlon Brando in “On the Waterfront”.  Heartbroken, he confronts his brother who, for a few quick bucks years earlier convinced Brando’s character to “take a dive” in a fight.  “I coulda been somebody Jimmy.  I coulda been a contender.  Now I’m nuttin but a bum.”  Tragic words.  But that “bum” found his courage – the heart of the champ.  The movie ends with a powerful heart-in-throat scene as Brando, broken and beaten, crosses the union line to work the docks.

So I ran the soccer field with a bunch of 20 year old convicts:  drug dealers and other societal misfits.  And they rooted me on and I did the same for them.

That night, I had an American Lit review session.  The guys were reading one of Thomas Paine’s immortal pieces.  It began “these are the time that try men’s souls”.

Ironically, those were the first words of the only letter my older son has written me in the three years since my arrest (and in another ironic twist, they are the last words of a letter I sent him on the exact date he wrote me).  As I was explaining Paine’s meaning to the three guys gathered around, my mind drifted back to soccer practice.  It was just a bunch of guys running, playing ball, having fun.

Does any of this matter?  Apparently, it does.  They asked me to play soccer because I belong.  I’m part of these guys’ lives in here.  I am the “father” figure, the guy to bring your questions to.  And for me, at this stage, that’s enough.  I matter to these college guys.  I’m a part of the team.