Avaleigh and Lindley,
As you are are going to figure out, your Daddy is a huge sports fan. I love the Cowboys, Braves, Red Sox, Hogs, and those Marked Tree Indians. While I love sports and these teams, the thing that I love most about sports is all of the things away from the field that happen. The stories of adversity, the lessons you learn, the things that happen that will help mold the person who plays sports into the person they become. There are other endeavors that do will do the same things, my journey just took me down the path of sports.
One of my favorite golfers is Tiger Woods. Now, Tiger has done some of the worst things that a person can do. He cheated on his wife with a plethora of women (one woman is way too many), he uses inappropriate language on the golf course, and he will toss his club in anger after a bad shot.
With all of that being said, I hope you grow up to like a player like Tiger Woods. I could care less that cheated on his wife or that he uses profanity on a golf course. Even though he is an adulterer, even though he might be phony and selfish, he might behave badly on a golf course…I don’t give a shit how people think about him. I want you to admire him.
Why? Why in the hell would I ever want you to look up to someone who has such shitty character and sets a bad example?
Because he doesn’t quit.
Girls, I want you to remember this…
People mess up. Nobody is perfect. We all have weaknesses and we all can learn from our mistakes. One day, I want you to watch “The Natural” and I want you to hear Roy Hobbs say, “Some mistakes you never stop paying for,” and know that it isn’t just words in a movie. You won’t appreciate winning until you have lost, you haven’t really lived until you have fought back, and you can’t understand what it is like to relish something until you have suffered, too. People are going to sit around and pick you apart just like we do sports heroes because we expect them to be perfect and superhuman and then we get pissed off when they aren’t or we nail the coffin shut because we like to see other people suffer.
Girls, Tiger has fought back. He didn’t go away. He keeps coming back and putting himself out there for ridicule. His game isn’t where it needs to be, but he pushes forward.
At the end of the day, I want you to know that great athletes should be appreciated, but not emulated. You can steal Mark McGuire’s bat flip or Sammy Sosa’s two step homerun hop without taking an illegal drug. You can steal Tiger’s fist pump without bagging every good looking guy you see or throwing your golf club after a bad shot. Athletes are here to entertain and inspire…..that’s really about it.
You will need a role model and those role models should be your mom and me. I don’t need you to watch athletes or people on TV to learn how to behave, I need to make sure I model it for you. I need athletes to teach you it’s fun to watch sports, to go play ball, and to pretend in our driveway that you are hitting the last second shot you saw on Saturday afternoon college basketball. I need to be the one to show you how to act when you miss it.
I love you yesterday, today, and forever,
Daddy
Dad of Girls 