Telegraph Ave: Oakland High

Chapter 16: Eye of the storm

Everybody struggles with something in their life.

The rich, the wealthy, and the happiest people have occurring problems to deal with. When life gets hard... you sometimes just have to lie to yourself, and pretend like everything is perfect. Knowing that it's never perfect, but you would never want anything to get the best of you.

I remember having to do a lot of that when I was struggling with depression. I would distant myself from everybody, even my own mother—because I knew she had enough stress to deal with on her own. I remember wanting to be by self in the dark and listen to music, that was probably my only remedy of being happy. I just knew being happy wouldn't last long no matter how much I wished for it too. Cause if it isn't one thing it's another, and that goes for the rest of the world.

Throughout that year of hardship I've come to realization with something that everybody should be aware of.

Life has to be hard on us... and I say that in the most sincere way as possible. I only say it has to be hard, cause if you're trying to reach the promise land, that process is never going to be easy. You have to go through obstacles to get you mentally prepared for when the bigger stage comes to play—you'll be ready. If everything was easy, everybody could do it, and in this lifetime everybody has a different path. God chose me to go through a certain path for a reason.

Maybe it's because he wanted to test my faith, or he knew that I was faithful/strong enough to go through those hardships. And that made me think—if someone else was to walk down the path I walked down, they probably would've became suicidal. That's why everybody has they're own destiny, and they have to walk through the fields of thorns and broken glass.

Lord knows I had too... but he put me through it at a good cost. If I could go back in time and change anything that ever happened to me, I wouldn't change a damn thing. Cause everything that I ever desired to come true, has become a reality.

Being bullied taught me to treat others how I wanted to be treated, being cheated on taught me how to keep a relationship alive, being held back on a football team taught me to never give up on something I love, being depressed taught me to never let happiness go to waste, and being alone taught me to always be by your family's side.

And that's why I stand where I am today.

As I tie up my last shoe lace on my cleats, I can feel my heart thump against my shoulder pads. Our first game was an away game, so we had to travel all the way over here to Galileo's High School. When we arrived we had 2 hours to get focused, meditate, or pray before we did our pre game stretch.

We did so 15 minutes ago, and people were beginning to fill in the bleachers.

Now we've only got two minutes before we go outside and the storm will finally commence. I have both pairs of my high school gloves, both of my arm sleeves on, long socks below the knees, Jersey in crop and god on my right shoulder.

Looks like I'm about ready to get out there and show out.

I sat in the middle of Markus and Jordan, as the 3 of us sat there in silence... patiently waiting for the coach to unleash us. The room was silent as tension filled the air  against our enemy. From the lack of sound in the room we could hear almost everybody in the bleachers outside. It sounded like many, way more than we saw than when we went out during our Pre-game. Marching bands were beginning to play as we heard bass drums vibrate the room.

The time has come...

"Everybody Up!" We heard Coach Floyd shout.

Every football player including me got up to our feet, and made our way into the middle of the locker room.