(May 28, 2021) – Okay, so it’s been a while since I’ve updated this space, and honestly it’s more because I had a ton of stuff going on but none of it was really “new”, and man if I’m bored with what I have going on in my life I can’t imagine any of you would want to read about it either.
So on to today’s subject: Retirement. Some time ago the track historian at South Boston Speedway sat down next to me in the press box, looked at me, and said “Kenny, getting old is hell.” It was my birthday in a couple days, I was turning 27. So you know, I didn’t think about it much at the time, but now I’m nearly 42 and holy hell was he right. Among other things, there comes a point where you have to sit down and decide “Can I (or should I) be doing the things I still do, and will that keep me moving for years to come?” And there’s really been no better example of that than my ability to play softball.
Most of you know me, and know that I played baseball for a long while, then lacrosse for a little while longer. After I broke my elbow playing lacrosse, I took a good amount of time off from doing much of anything and got SUPER fat in the process. Eventually some neighbors found out I’d played baseball and had been pretty okay at it. They needed a warm body for their softball team and off I went. It’s softball, what’s the worst that can happen right?
Some people who were athletes at some point in their life have the ability to turn off whatever that thing is in their brain that tells them to go all out and if something seems doable to just go do it. Others can’t. I’m definitely in the latter category, come to find out. For years now I’ve told myself I’d take it easy, only to see myself an hour later diving for ground balls and sliding into bases just like I did 20+ years ago. I tell myself I won’t, but I can’t seem to not do it.
Over the pandemic year I managed to hurt my back by just existing, and that was new. Usually I can look at an injury and go “Oh, that’s what happened.” In this case, it’s a degenerative disk in my back and a couple other disks that seem to be slowly sliding like tectonic plates. So I spent a summer doing physical therapy (Duke Sports Medicine has kept me going forever now) and getting back into pretty decent shape. I’ve been able to run normally and my golf game is just about back to where it needs to be.
So with all that I decided I could ease into this season’s softball season. I figured I’d do my coaching thing and otherwise just play when we needed me on the field. That proved to be about half of the time, which was fine. I ran around, dove for a couple balls, got knocked over once, and was pretty sore but otherwise was seemingly fine. That’s until this past weekend.
We were down a handful of runs and there was a short flyball to left field. Knowing their catcher wasn’t great, I decided to tag up and go for it. While I don’t run terribly fast, once I get all this moving, I go. So I charged down the line and saw that their 6’4″, somewhere around 280 lbs pitcher was making a break for home to intercept the throw. For whatever reason, this triggered my “KEN, YOU NEED TO SLIDE” part of my brain and I went in hard. I got hit by the pitcher, and took out the catcher, and that was that. I hopped up, checked on the catcher (who, in having the pitcher block her view, didn’t see me sliding in and got taken out) and noticed my back was starting to tighten up.
As I walked off the field I started having the same pain that I’d experienced with my nerves in my back that led me to find out my disks were all weird. So that wasn’t great. Then the muscle spasms kicked in, and things like “walking”, or “sitting” became super painful. From that point on there was a doctor’s visit, a bunch of medications, and a future visit back to Duke Sports Medicine to get me back right.
I love team sports. I love playing on a team with great people. The softball team I’ve been on is one of the best collections of people I’ve ever experienced. And that’s probably why I tried to make another go at this after the back injury last year: Being with these people is fun, and being on the field with them is some of the most fun I’ve had playing on a team in any capacity. But there’s only so many times I can ask my wife to help me up the stairs because it hurts to move, so I’m having to step away from this kind of sport.
I’m fortunate that I have running and golf to fall back on as something I can do to challenge myself. Mix in iRacing and some other things and I at least still have some outlets to kind of work through the bit of competitiveness I have in me. And to be honest, most of the things I still have I can continue to get better at, so there’s a bit of a drive there as well.
But I’m going to miss being on a diamond at some level. Team sports has been a thing I’ve always done, whether it be baseball, lacrosse, softball, or whatever. And more times than not I’ve played it in a way that I enjoy: Kind of recklessly while throwing my body around. That ended last weekend, but I had a good 35 years or so of it, so in the end I think it’s going to be alright.