2 Mikey

Poor Mikey gave everything he had for fifteen minutes under lights (and they are expensive lights). He went down not once but twice in the same game with the same head (his only one). Rules meant to protect him from returning to the field did not apply. Officials determined he lay there resting from a sprint, and his sudden prone position was not from impact or concussion. He knew the danger in his sport, that helmet and pads are not for show. He signed a waiver, accepting all responsibility for injury, death and “outbursts of rage” by other players, coaches and referees. His parents signed it, too, to make it clear the school would not be liable should injury or worse occur. At 5’6” and 160 pounds he was David, weaving through Goliaths armed for battle. We sat in the colosseum, spectators of sport, and cheered him on, the beat of drums stirring passions only a clash of titans can satisfy. The brilliant play, naked without the tension of orchestrated violence, is not enough. The threat to quarterback, the linemen pushing back, the fake pass, all are lost without the crushing weight of a six foot, 300 pound tackle, like going to war without airplanes and ships or weapons of any sort. (What fun is that?) We’d miss the impassioned announcer, breathless in describing the mobilization of forces, and the welcome distraction from our boring lives back home. His brain was moving thirty feet per second when it slammed into his skull, full stop, a direct collision of his helmet against one opposing his completion. “Get up, Mikey. Get up.” The man next to me urged the fallen player to recover from the blow, as if by willing it, three pounds of brain matter could be restored, and the physics of smashing soft tissue against bone with a thousand Newtons could be waved away with wishful thinking. Poor Mikey, jersey number 2, gave everything he had, for the colors of his team, and the pride of his school, while we sat there with our Roman hearts, and cheered him on. Notes: On Friday, September 12, 2014, Michael Trimble, jersey #2, wide receiver for the Walnut Hills High School football team, slammed helmet first against the helmet of a player from Fairfield running in nearly the opposite direction. He eventually got up and walked off the field, only to return to the game a short time later. He was knocked down a second time.