A couple of frustrations from today's Sam Houston State University National Championship football game (besides the obvious frustrations of being manhandled for the second straight year, by the same opponent, in the title game):
We sat in front of some pretty frustrating fans. "Frustrating" is probably actually putting it lightly, putting a positive spin on it. These were obviously college students who had been drinking for a while . . . before a game that started at noon.
They were obscene, loud, and just plain rude. Times like these always remind me of a game I attended at Georgia Tech a few years ago. A friend invited me to go; and I greatly enjoyed the day with him. One of the highlights was when he turned around to some drunk college students, annoying us all, and let them have it. He's one of the most gentle souls you'll ever meet. And it was awesome. I had a newfound appreciation for him as that happened.
I found myself in his role today. At one point, I actually began to turn around to get on to them, as there were a number of children all around us, hearing some pretty horrible things. But something stopped me. That's probably for the best.
But that whole episode (and our ensuing headaches for the rest of the day) caused me to think a bit more deeply about it. What's sad to me is not their sad state, the incredibly shrill voice the young lady behind me had that caused my head to pound, or anything else along those lines. What's most saddening to me is that the actions of four people not only affected the way they experienced the game. Their actions had a big impact upon the way many of us did.
When do I (and we all) do things similar to that? When do I cause others around me to have a poor experience of something because of my selfishness, because of my not taking others into account.
One of the genius things about the Christian story, to me, is that it causes us to look outside ourselves, to think not only how am I enjoying/experiencing something . . . but how am I/my actions affecting others' enjoyment/experience of something?
And, at the same time, how can I help others around me to experience and enjoy things more deeply?
It goes both ways.
One other observation: the whole thing where everyone holds up 4 fingers at the end of the 3rd quarter really grinds my gears. It has for a while. I've never really been able to wrap my head around why. But something hit me today.
Doing that (when teams along the sidelines, and their fans in the stands, hold up 4 fingers, signifying that the really important time, the 4th quarter, is about to begin) basically says that what happened the previous 3 quarters is not nearly as important as what is about to happen.
Now sure, the 4th quarter is important, it really is. Many times what happens then decides the game. But that's just crazy to place that much importance on it.
Take today, for example: we got our butts kicked in the 3rd quarter . . . really bad. That was the game. We can hold up four fingers all we want to. But in the stands, we all knew it was over at that point. The 3rd quarter, not the 4th quarter, doomed us today.
But bigger than any of that, the whole four fingers thing says to me that the destination, not the journey, is what is important. And I think that's a pretty narrow way to look at life. If what we are really concerned about is what happens at the very end of an event (or life), we're missing out on a whole lot of really good stuff.
Again, the Christian story is genius. It, at its core, implies, that life is a journey . . . not a destination. Life is to be enjoyed, experienced, really lived out all along the way . . . not just at the very end.
But then again, it's difficult to enjoy some parts of life when a twenty-one year old incredibly intoxicated young woman is screaming in your ear :)
I guess, though, that's part of the journey.
As Johnny Cash says, "I don't like it. But I guess things happen that way."
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