Ode to Sport

I don't think you ever really know your own country until you spend some considerable time elsewhere as a foreigner. What is unique, desirous or noteworthy of your native country can never really be perceived until you’re plunged into the chaos and newness of a foreign culture. A culture where you have neither authority nor knowledge of the workings or origins of its customs.

It’s from this place of humility and wonder that the prodigal son finally sees what it is that has always connected him to his birthplace. That with which he cannot live without. And it is always that which calls him home, prodding him to lay to rest the wanderlust of his youth, and to undertake the difficult reconciliation with an unchanging past and far more familiar future.

As springtime slowly returns to Northern France, just as much as the almond blossoms and warm spring sun of my youth, I’m reminded of the return of baseball season. Indeed, of all the cultural aspects I miss most from back home, the American sports calendar is felt most strongly.

The New Year fervor of bowl games and the frigid warfare of the NFL playoffs slowly ceding way to spring’s playoff excitement in hockey and basketball. The languorous dog days of summer at the ballpark culminating in the chill of October baseball and the return of crisp fall afternoons with the sting of pigskin on bare hands.

Most of my youth can be seen as a sort of active meditation centered on the pursuit or practice of those sports at the heart of American culture. And I have no doubt that this education did as much for me as any other to open my eyes to the wonder of this world and my place in it.

One does well to resist the temptation to reduce the sports world to one of overheated egos and runaway testosterone. To the unpracticed eye it may appear so but to the true seer there is a world of myth and moral truth of incomparable richness. And it’s every bit as true as those found in the more respectable domains of literature or politics.

Indeed, given the choice between a randomly chosen ballgame, movie or book, I’ll choose the ballgame any day. As I find it’s much easier to lie and hide behind convention and sentiment in the arts (theater excepted perhaps) than in the world of sports. Remember I’m in the midst of a French literature MA too. Of course if I had to choose between Maupassant’s short stories or the Magic-Bird battles of my youth I’m not sure the choice would be at all the same.

The real tragedy though is the crude, reductive choice we're so often pressured into as children between what are two of the great joys in life, sport and art. I only wish that rather than see the world in terms of jocks and geeks, we begin to imagine each life as a canvas or playing field (choose your metaphor) where we might explore the great play of ego and id we’re all engaged in.

The crude specialization our society forces upon us has created a world where sport and art have been reduced to passive, consumer experiences for far too many people. This Faustian wager is perhaps the most dangerous of all those offered us. For both body and soul are lost in it and little joy can ever come in its wake. The good news is you don't have to buy into this lie.

It wasn't the sensible advice of some guidance counselor or career coach that allowed Ruth and I to spend two of the most enriching years of our lives here in France. It was the courage to take a chance and believe in the vital necessity of following our dreams. Indeed, had we taken the sensible route we would have certainly never left our teaching jobs back home in Long Beach.

It should come as no surprise though that both of us are former college athletes. For much of the courage it took to follow our dreams to France was no doubt forged on the courts and playing fields of our youth. In this same way, sports have played an equally vital role in helping me adapt to each new culture I've encountered along my life's journey.

For all the wonderful cultural richness I experienced in Africa, one of my most memorable experiences was watching Brazil beat Germany in the World Cup final in the company of my Mauritanian host family. I’d canceled classes that afternoon to make it home in time for the start of the match. Our TV was powered by a car battery and we watched, reclining against the cool mud walls of their modest home. Each time Brazil threatened to score, a torrent of shouting and support would fill the air in Pulaar, their native tongue.

Our stay in France has been marked by similar excursions into the French sporting world. Just as much as the language or cuisine, these sporting excursions have allowed me to understand the culture in ways I’d have not been capable without. As much as anything else it was watching Federer win on a rainy Sunday in Paris for the first time that will mark our time here in France. These experiences have been of an incalculable worth.

Amidst all these travels I’ve never forgotten that the first really vital lessons I learned in life were on the playing field. Whether it was the times learning baseball from my dad or the long solitary hours shooting hoops in the driveway while recreating the epic battles of my heroes, sports have so often been the compass by which I've navigated the mystery and wonder of this world.

And with each new spring, the promise of hope eternal is renewed. As I recall again the simple joy and mystery I first knew as a boy back home. One boy standing alone before the world and his dreams.