Ejection

I've been here long enough now that the days and weeks have begun to blur together.  Unless there's some big event, like a trip or a visitor, it's hard for me to remember exactly what happened when. The order of the books I've read things has become confused; even the order of the games isn't clear unless I take some time to think about it. This week this process became very apparent because of the sheer amount of downtime we've had, and the lack of an otherwise constant source of activity. Because of an upgrade to our service, our internet has been out since Monday the eighth. More on that later. For now, I mention it as an explanation both for the way I've opened the post and for its tardiness.

This week we had an excuse to think about home more than usual because of something that we’ve all been looking forward to since we’ve been over here: the Fourth of July. Since I can remember, the Fourth has been an event for my family almost on par with Thanksgiving or Easter.  It’s my cousin Tori’s birthday, so my aunt and uncle always host a large family party, at which a family wiffleball game is always contested.  For quite a few years of my youth the game invariably ended in tears and quarrels about what was and wasn’t fair, but we always calmed down and made up in time for fireworks at the end of the night.  There’s something special about the Fourth to me: although I’m not particularly patriotic, the opportunity to share an appreciation of what we are free to do with family and friends is unbelievably important to me. Especially if the embodiment of that appreciation is expressed by lighting off mild explosives.  Every summer of my life has been marked by the Fourth, and we set out to make it so that this year wouldn’t be any different. 

We started the day with an early workout and on our way back home went on a quest to find some good old American beer and grill food.  Typically while I’m here I wouldn’t think of drinking anything but German beer, but on the Fourth we were looking for some Budweiser or Miller, which we were told would be within reason to find. Alas, after canvassing two different beverage stores and a grocery store, we failed to find anything American, except for a specialty California Pale Ale that I bought for almost three euros a bottle.  No hotdogs either.  Travesty.  But it was okay; we still had plans to cook out with some teammates at the practice facility.  So we put on our most patriotic regalia, raised the flag on Monika’s flagpole, and set out for the Serbs.

Steve knows what's up

Cooking out was a great time.  It was a small group, the three Serbs, the three of us Americans along with Casey, Mitch’s girlfriend visiting for the week, and our German teammate Jakob.  The weather was fantastic, as it seems to always be at least in most of my memories of the Fourth, and we had plenty of meat to grill even without hotdogs.

Everyone hanging out while Vlad grills. 

The best part of the day in my opinion was explaining the history of the holiday to our Serbian teammates. You forget, being so isolated, that there are some things that are a wholly American experience; it’s almost as if at times it seems the entire world lies between our coasts, with so many different regions and ways of life.  This is especially the case if you live as I had up til this summer, only barely knowing the cultures of the U S of A and never traveling outside of our bubble, whether out of inability or choice.  I realized that I have never had to explain to someone the reason we celebrate our Independence Day, and the weight that the more philosophical roots of the holiday carry, especially considering the reputation of today’s United States: Vlad jokingly refers to us Americans as aggressors. So half reading, half reciting the body of the Declaration of Independence to Branko and Strahinja was a surreal experience, considering their limited knowledge of the ins and outs of US history.  That every man possesses the unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness brought questions, of slavery and other ugly stains on the document we hold so dear.  Steve and I did our best to explain this, and it is an explanation that I consider to be the heart of my feelings about my country: We set out to create the ideal country for people to live in.  We’ve made mistakes along the way, as is our wont: we are of course only human.  But since that initial Fourth so many years ago we have worked to make that dream a reality, an effort that has not and will not cease, that will evolve and grow through time, and that the most important part of the description of that effort is the pronoun associated: We.  That might be a shade on the idealistic side, but hey, so was declaring independence on the grounds of an ideology.  We finished the day grilling burgers for Monika, and I was able to Skype with my entire family at the aforementioned Fourth of July party.  I was happy.        

God bless the USA and all that. Yes, that is a Captain America tank and my America shoes.

We had a home game this weekend against the Hamburg Huskies, and we were playing again with a depleted roster. I was preparing to have to play defense in case of emergency, and, of course, calamity struck yet again. During pregame drills our starting strong safety made a play on a ball in a drill and broke his finger so badly that it required surgery.  Obviously, he wasn't able to play with that, so Strahinja and I were asked to take turns playing free safety in his stead. Stra had practiced with the defense throughout the week; I had not. It wasn't the worst set-up in the world, but it was certainly far from ideal. We both played on most of the special teams as well, and of course on offense. 

 Unfortunately there wasn't a ton of time to rest, so looks like here I stole a moment on the field

The game started out a bit rough, with them opening the game with a touchdown drive and then a pick-six before we really even had a chance to respond. We dug in though, and played hard so that by the second quarter we pulled back into position and a six point game. From there the game went back and forth, with scoring on both sides. The fourth quarter was particularly tight. It began with them leading, 38-35, then 45-35, then we scored to tighten it up to 45-42. Then things spiraled out of control.

Pretty nice sequence of my first receiving TD since 2010

On a long catch and run in the fourth quarter before my third and final touchdown of the game, I was flagged for a facemask after I stiffarmed a defender and threw him down. That call isn't made too often, and I don't agree with it still, but it wasn't a big deal. We still scored. Then after a sack and the ensuing scrum in which their player refused to let go of the ball and allow Mitch to get up I went in to defend my quarterback. That is the instinct that has been ingrained into my football subconscious so much that it is more second-nature than anything I do with any sort of cognizance. I tried to push their player off of Mitch, and in the struggle he grabbed my facemask and I grabbed his neck. I should not have done it, but in the situation it was what my instinct demanded. By the time the dust settled, three flags had been thrown. I wasn't thinking much of it; it's part of the game after all, and more likely than not the result of the flags would be off-setting penalties. To my surprise, the not situation of that saying ended up being the reality, and the referees--incorrectly, mind you--assessed all three personal foul calls to me. We were backed up to deep into our own territory, and another pick-six was that result of the drive. I don't remember the order of things, but during the last defensive drive I played I was so tired out that I had a bit of a hallucination; I wasn't sure what was real and what was not for about thirty seconds, long enough for them to throw a touchdown pass where I should have been if I had not been staggering around, trying to get off the field. I drank as much water as I could once I got to the sideline and went back in on offense for a last minute effort.The game was almost out of reach for us at that point, until I made it completely out of reach. After an incomplete pass one of Hamburg's defenders mouthed off to Mitch, talking trash. I shot back, which was the dumbest thing to do considering the circumstances, and after being overheard by a ref, was flagged again. Over here there is a rule about personal fouls: once a player receives more than two personal fouls, that player is ejected and suspended for up to three games. I had to sit on the steps leading up to the locker room for the short remainder of the game, before an amiable trip through the handshake line (no sarcasm there, I really enjoyed the game til then) and a talk with their coach and then the referees, who explained the circumstances. I approached them as someone looking to learn from my mistakes without any argument of the ruling, so I hope that they will consider that in how they assess  my suspension. They still haven't given us a ruling on the length of the suspension. Final statline: 11 rushes for 71 yards, 2 TDs, 3 receptions for 104 yards, 1 TD, 1 tackle, and one ejection. Because of our schedule, I won't get to play again until, at the earliest, August eleventh. This is the second time I've been ejected from a game in my career, and both of the instances have come under, in my opinion and others, tenuous circumstances. I just have to deal with it and keep my nose clean for the rest of the season.

That was probably on me.

With the internet out, I was able to be a bit more productive than usual in terms of reading and writing. I finally finished the Rabbit series, with Rabbit at Rest.  As I said before, Updike created something more than a character and fictional world in his series. I can see myself rereading the individual books again in the future, once I am Rabbit's own ages in them, just to compare and contrast my own experiences.  The final novel finished exactly how it should have: coming full circle and embracing the qualities of the character that existed from the series' start. I laid a friend to rest when I finished the last page. In my free time, I also went through many of the documents I have on my computer, stretching all the way back to my junior year of high school. It was interesting to chart my intellectual growth, to see areas in which I have improved and areas in which I have, to my surprise, always been strong. Rereading a few of my early stories provided me a pathway back not only to what I wrote, but how I felt writing them, a surreal experience. After this, I'm even more excited to focus on the project I've been working on since I've been here. 

I end this post now, not only because I'm finished, but because I must leave the internet. I think that once I return home it will be back, but I thought that yesterday as well, so here's to hoping.  If not, catch you all once we've returned to the modern age.