Football

Football..."Life is like a football game...you always hit the line hard," Theodore Roosevelt. Blood, sweat, tears, my life, and I can't ask for any more perfect.

I bled on the field today. I hit, was hit, hit, was hit...and only back at it again. Two-a-days, three-a-days, whatever-a-days, been going at it and bleeding out of almost every pore imaginable. Damn line stance... get too low for my own good. Fingers chipped and slashed away by the long blades of dry grass, nails broken and torn off to every foward burst of movement I make. Mouthgaurd proved useless, my teeth still grind against each other to every push, and I taste the white bone and enamel, only to start chewing on my own gums for comfort. Contacts dried up to the heat, and I cry blood, as the dehydrated lenses carved into my sockets. Legs popped at every command, kneecaps showed white faces, and the red seems to replace the darker yellow of my skin. But I bled on that field today. I bled because every pint of blood was worth all my effort. Aggression...I was addicted to the pain, and I loved the taste of my own blood. My vampiric yearn for my own blood was too great for me to shudder behind shadows, and I let my beast free. The physical violence and the power is what I sought with every tear in my body. I loved it when they tried clawing into my calloused skin, and I loved it when they bled bellowing screams of pain into my ears. Masachist they called me... every single drop meant I was getting better. If I wasn't bleeding, I wasn't trying my best or pushing hard enough. If I wasn't bleeding, I wasn't feeding. I bled on that field today because that field was now a part of me, and I, it.



I sweat on that field today. Oh... did I sweat...Neither the rush of Niagra Falls, nor the flow of the Mississippi can compare to what came out of my brow. The heat only fell second to Death Valley, and that field was covered in a visual mirage of luscious green, a facade of the sand and dryness it held. Helmet black, jersey black, pads black, girdle black, gear black, and shoes black, I guess I was asking for more heat, but my passion for my colors surpassed the tick marks on the thermometer. My head burned a fiery blaze, with my helmet only to cover my true identity under skin. My hair seered off as my mind and skull were beated with the hot California sun, mixed with the aggression and love for the game. My cleats smelled of burnt rubber. The bottoms slowly melted away, leaving my soles naked to run with the burning grass. Steam flew off my neck, almost as if the sweat itself were trying to escape the unbearable heat that laid upon my skin. I sweat on that field today because I love the game. I sweat because dehydration was a sign of weakness, and I never succumbed to such level. I sweat on that field today because if I didn't, I sure as hell, didn't show my true expression of passion.

I cried on that field today...Oh I cried, to the pain and the anguish that I felt. I cried to the loss, and I cried to the failure. Men...oh...my brothers...I tried to lead you into victory, but I have only led you to the one thing you did not want, and for that I am sorry, I am so sorry. But my remorse will not heal your pain, I know it can't, the scoreboard still reads the very numbers we refuse to look at. I cried for my brothers at arms. Our tears trickled down our cheeks, and chose the path down onto the cold, wet grass. I cried because every inch we earned, we were sent back only further, and dominated at our own. I told myself that I will not let them down, and I know that I made sure my enemies shuddered at my fiery cry, but I still cannot shake away the tears that I cry. The emotional pain could only be represented what men of the game should not do. My pads, my helmet, and my boys were all I had to lean on for comfort. And I as always, the last one on the field. The lights shined only onto me, providing warmth and invision. I circled, and circled, entrailing every second of the game that just happened and the games of past. Put a smile on my face, and my lips blocked away those salty tears. I remember my first touchdown on ym first year of playing football. I remember my years of trying to find my position and where I belong to the game. I remember this year, when I was voted captain of my brothers, the hard-to-the-bone linemen, these were my men. And I led them through the thickest and the thinest, to the now. And now here we are...

Champions of the Art. Supreme rulers of the Arena. True Football players and Young Men.

Live your life like a football game. Be addicted to something, and push hard for it, push so hard. It may hurt now, but look back when in the lights of success, because you earned it all, and smile.

Grand Canyon, AZ

Couldn't think of a title that actually felt suitable to the adventure and the mind-blowing experience that I had encountered this weekend. When one thinks of the Grand Canyon, one thinks of majesty at its finest and most intense, only to depict a photograph of what it actually surmounts to be. But the trail, my friends, the trail...

Honestly thought I was not going to make this trip with Steve. He had asked me multiple times, and I simply replied with a shrug of my shoulders and a light grin, complementing a tilt of my head. The only reason that would aave prevented me from travelling with him was the fact that I may have a checkride soemtime soon this upcoming a week. Checkride equals hours of chair-flying and mental preparation, and not much time for fun. But as the Friday approached, I figured that I could use a break from flying and studying everyday, so we ventured out into the evening, winked with hints of sun and purple dust.

Finally, we reached the site, our campgrounds. 9:05PM now. I only thought of how it was going to be another mosquito massacre during my sleep. I prayed for a gentle breeze to blow those annoying buzzards away. And the breeze came, kissing the top of our cups, filled with Cherry coke and Tattooed Rum. Drank about two full cups each, and felt and looked like the rocks themselves, faces blushed red with relaxation and joy. And I passed to the breeze, as the temperature continually dropped to a comfortable 60 degrees. Awoken then to an upcoming thunderstorm, Steve and I quickly saddled up the gear and accsesories, and hustled to the car. 4:00 AM. I am pretty sure Steve and I averaged about an even 2 hours each of sleep, not the healthiest sleep. We just gazed into the wndow, looking at the sky. The moon shown so bright, the clouds moving very rapidly, and the stars uncountable, could not think of a better night to be out.
4:30 AM, time to get ready for the hike down. We made it down to the Horseshoe Mesa in record time, traversing down 2,600 feet in less than 3 miles. 6:45AM-7AM, not sure, but definietly satisfied to reach goal. The rocks we walked on began to paint green and blue, beautiful turqouise. As we gazed in the best of what we can find, we found ourselves stumbling upon history. Not only ground that has been eroded with water and wind for thousands of years, but old prospected mines. Dark, mysterious, and almost fearful, my careful spirit flew with Steve's. Like old explorers we did, and the mine shivered cold and moist, welcoming the most daring souls.
And the souls came back out, only to remember the pace back upwards. Fatigue kicked in, and my body began to torment, and my mind resisting temptation to fall under cowardice and tear. Too much pride, I kept going up with Steve, making sure to soothe my mind with water. The summer monsoonal skies, cried and dropped few tears at our persistance, as my girl were praying that we make it back to the top. And her prayers answered, at 10:05AM.
Steve drove back into the afternoon heat, and I ventured into my own world. We stayed silent, both content and accomplished to the feat we had just conquered. I could only reminisce to when I only hiked a sixth of that trail with my family, only to come abckl again as deja vu, and add another couple of miles. The conquest seemed as only a symbolic virtue to me. Life is like the Grand Canyon, so immense and so large. Scarred and eroded away by years and years of experiences, but still beautiful, and still astonishing. These thought rushed behinf my retinas, painting maserpieces in front of me, only to wake up in my apartment, ready for another climb.

Dedication to a Mentor

Never thought that I would have one. Some of the greatest leaders can be thought of when asked, "Do you have a mentor?" Sure, but they are more of role models. And I could also say that I have a mentor, and they are my parents. But they are my parents, always have been behind me from day one to guide me through the world. And I could also say that I have a mentor, and they are my friends. But they are my relax. They help me when I am stressed, they are there to make life seem like a breeze in some of the toughest times. But I don't think that is quite a mentor. A mentor goes a little something like this:

SATs! Its that time of the high school career, when everyone that wants to go to college starts cramming for the SATs...that dreadful test that consists of hours on hours of multiple choice questions, and an essay that is graded on a scale of 1-6. Did not look forward to this test like any other test in high school. There were sections of math, reading, and writing. Math, of course, this part of me relates to the stereotype of being Asian. Reading, fine, I can read and talk about it alright. But writing...Lord, help me. Feelings of shuddering fear and despair tremble my spine, as if they took froms of hands, gripping the long column of bone and nerve, and jumbling it around and around, cauing my mind only the worst of stressed headaches.

So, like any other student that was worried about the SATs, I signed up for a class during the weekends. It was a writing class that intensely engages students in practing writing and reading sections of the SATs, taught by Miz Parmalee Cover. Please...she looked like a push over at first blush, and of course, I focused on other important things for the weekend: the football game the night before, the flight tomorrow morning, the homework that I should be working on, and when I was going to go swimming in the next bottle of achohol. I just ran trough the course, week by week, continually working at imporving my writing skills, and going through the motions of the practice SATs. At the end of the course, I was given a private note, and Miz Cover had said I was her favorite student. My heart shot through the ground, as if I had some responsibility to uphold the consequences of my actions of not trying my best.

The course only ended, and I find that I am staring at a horrible grade on my first essay in Honors english. Sighed...as I stared down that blood red mark, almost as if the paper were bleeding because of the pain it had to endure as I was writing the essay. Lost without options, I turned to the only help that I knew to salvage my academic progress in english, turned to Miz Cover. And every Saturday, from then on, we would meet in the ealry evening, to practice more writing and reading. Started out as private tutoring, killing two birds with one stone. I was saving my grade, and I was practicing for the SATs.

And every weekend, as I grew closer and closer to being a better writer and harnessing my inner art, we became more and more fond of one another, until meetings were more of times to hang out and read and discuss each other's writing pieces. Outside of flight training, I never had a closer mentor and tutor. She had taught me to channel my feelings outside the football field and outside the cockpit onto the paper. She had taught me that perseverence can actually lie in many aspects of life, outside of just intended goals. And she had triggered my addiction.

It is an addiction to writing pieces and works of art. It is an addiction to lighting my mind, and pourind acidic floods of emotions and experiences. It is an addiction to inhale life and blow out puffs of graphite dust.

Miz Cover...that is what a mentor is to me. Not only has she taught me how to write, but she introduced a new life, a new angle at which I live. Never has she sat me down, never has she jabbed her pointing finger at my nose, and never has she lectured me. Only through her teachings of writing. And to end this student mentor relationship is not possible, even as I am in Arizona and she in Oregon, to end with a period seems wrong, and so I break the rules of run-on sentences and proper mechanical sentence structure with this, to only signify what a mentor is