Neanderthal Country

    

Neanderthal Country

     We were inventing rugby as it happened back in the eighties. The exchange students who thought it would be a hoot to start a team were long gone. Ernie left. So it became Coach Clueless. He was all hips and elbows and when you would try to smash him at practice you would knock yourself out on his bony bits and he would laugh. He was all pointy bones and savage glee. It didn't stop you from trying to take him out, that's what practice is for, that is one of the real joys of rugby. Establishing the pecking order. Sorting the Alphas from the rest. Agressively correcting a fellow assholes worldview, all in good fun, WHAT-CHOO-GOT? thought so....

     So as a formative rugby experience, it was natural that I dropped more than a couple of bows on people. Please enjoy this  video. (A video by a  dude named LudaKris from Atlanta who didn't pull a gun on us in Halloween behind the strip club.)
     WE CAME HERE TO THROW SOME BOWS!
     This song came out when I was teaching in the hood. Teaching in the hood was almost like rugby. In my first semester I met the Cooper twins. North Philly, mainstreaming meant that the Cooper twins were in the same classroom again. Running things again. Mainstreaming was when the main theme in Public Educations seemed to be "How does failing English affect a teenager's self esteem?” Social promotion. In a system where teaching English was very similar to teaching a foreign language. This song helped me learn to interact with the culture, and build bridges with my frequently high students.

    Hollywood in Atlanta for a rugby tournament with PAC. Trouble behind the strip club as we were leaving. Some of boyfriends didn't care for our particular brand of macho, and there was a gun, but we were leaving anyway. 

     There are times in a rugby career when time slows down. Time in life when you measure every breath. Is this it? I will try to describe a few of those moments that stand out. Time has almost come to a stop a few times in my rugby career and it is beautiful and magical.

     But first I want to apologize to that Asian dude in the b game when I was playing inside center. He came in for the tackle and, me being a prick in those days, I just lowered my elbow into his ear hole and he went down. I felt clever until the party when I found out that he had suffered one concussion too many and as a result would probably be forced to retire by his wife. Well, this sport isn't for everybody. Also, I guess my suggestions about proper tackling technique should have been shared in a different venue. Live and learn. Basically, I wasn't always the nicest person. I bit someone who was trying to choke me and he stopped choking me immediately. I may have sexually assaulted a few people on the rugby field for strategic advantage. I shit on my second row man's shoulder in a scrum. Luckily I was wearing compression shorts at the time (as well as two pairs of underwear, for support>) So I took a knee and tore the underwear off, wiped, threw it into the sideline wastebasket and didn't miss a scrum.

I had many sneaky, dirty ways to make people let go of the ball, but I was just doing what props are supposed to do. Let's have a beer.