Sometimes you don't have to meet someone for them to have a definite impact on your life. There are many examples of that in history and the world today.
The thing that I am experiencing more now in my life is the intangibility of that inspiration, and the places where it comes from. I have, in my willingness been inspired by those I would have never even listened to before. From an 82 year old God fearing woman to the 17 year old punk kid.
There are of course those that inspire you with their story. It is right there that I find it funny in a cool and weird way that Marshawn Lynch and his story would inspire someone like me.
I am just an average white guy from Seattle, I have not lived even a sliver of the life that he has. Yet, as his history and his present combined in front of these eyes, I found kinship somehow. No, I could not understand much of the lifestyle and other things that made the man. I could not understand the behavior, or the antics at times. I could understand something though and that was passion and perseverance, something that I write of much on this little interweb raindrop.
Mr. Lynch happened to me at just the right time. I was going through some championship seasons as well. Meaning this was for all the marbles, this is where I take my life back from addiction and misery. I did not do it on a football field but the real field called life, and it was just as difficult to me to make it those 24 hours, those few yards at a time. I did not suffer the bruises and breaks, torn muscles and ice baths. I had to do it on the inside with all of my non physical abilities, the emotional and mental bruises and ice baths. The kinship came in the silence and in the din of a Beast Quake.
I always felt, probably like many, that I was just a little different, a little off. Koontz has a series about a guy named Odd Thomas, my father's name was Thomas, I felt a kinship there too. I was in the middle of the end of my drinking and drugging, I was a daily blackout behind the wheel at that time. No employer would hire me, I had burned my career in the restaurant industry at every bridge.
Living off of a freshly sold family home's money and leeching it off my mother. My wife was at her wits end, I had nothing inside and yet I had everything inside. I was the fool and costing everyone I ever cared for dearly. I needed something in my life bigger than I was and at that time there was going to be no God allowed.
The Quake had happened the season before I got pulled over by Lynnwood's finest in September, a block from my home at 1:30 am. I was a wreck, smoking pot and drinking all day was normal, I cannot exactly, well yes I can exactly tell you what I felt. I was not scared really, I was grateful actually, I could finally get the help that I needed, they would see what was wrong with me and fix it. Needless to say I did not know that I would be doing the work, with a lot of help, but work none the less. There was something brewing in town at that time, a new found pride in a sleepy NFL franchise that was seemingly blacklisted from day one. Beastquake had happened, and I was watching this short rookie kid lead a bunch of men like it was ballet. I watched a man that had been tossed around in life and the league without mercy run.
It is often said the he runs to hurt people, go through them, not around. I did not see that at all, I saw a man who with every devastating hit freed himself of a past that was at times out of his control. I saw a clarity in those wild eyes and tattoos, dreadlocks and skittles. With every weekend that I watched and for the following week online, I saw someone who was defining himself, his way, the way that it was intended. I saw the work, and it helped me work harder on those things I needed to change. I saw the dedication and the teamwork needed for success and it taught me. I saw my team go to the Super Bowl and dance the dance of dreams, a collection of maybes honed it to positives.
As I sit here almost four years to the day later, I am grateful to Mr. Lynch. The inexplicable mystery of God's ways and to the lessons I learned between the silence. Thank You Sir.
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