how else could you tie my head to the sky?

So. My plan for right now was to do some pilates and then my euro homework. Currently, I am eating dark chocolate while sitting at the computer. I know, I have stunning self-control. But I should be allowed to ease into life again a bit, don't you think? I mean, today was rough after a week of doing whatever I want and getting some 12 hours of sleep every night.

So, Sunday night, Brett Favre may have played his last game. Granted, people have said that going on three years now, but he definately sounded like someone who wasn't coming back. And all of my friends laugh at me "He's so old," and "my god, I think his hair is going gray. It is!" and "isn't he in Viagara commercials?" (By the way, it's medication for heartburn, you idiots!) But can you imagine a football league where someone isn't willing to bomb it 50 yards on the third down, or believe they can come back 14 points with 3 minutes to go? Who else breaks their receivers' fingers? Who else takes huge hits for their runners? I saw one play where a lineman was charging right at him, and Favre grabbed this guy's jersey and laid him right out. No other quarterback does that! After playing for nearly as long as I've been alive, and no matter how amusing that is to everyone, he played every game like it was the most fun he's ever had, like it means everything and at the same time is just another game.

When you grow up, your parents are not there telling you how to act and what to do. Just in the same way, your heroes start to fade. They may still be there, they may still be an inspiration, but they don't have the same presence in your life. It becomes your responsibility to take all of the lessons you have learned from them, stop admiring them and start applying them. It's time to take the traits you've long revered in someone else and begin to make them your own qualities. It's the period of transformation; from having a hero, to maybe someday, to someone, being a hero.

So, as an effort to maybe end the mockery, I will finally spell it out the lessons that can be learned from nothing but an ancient football player. Listen up, you!
1) Passion. You know how many people live out their careers, relationships and entire lives without even a shred of passion? Too many. It isn't really living at all. We are all so afraid to feel, to care, to give into something. It's not right.
2) Fearlessness, courage, bravery, whatever you want to call it. Action in spite of fear. Resolution to never let fear or doubt make your decisions for you. Living so that at the end of the day, you are not saying "What would have happened if I had tried..." Living so at the end of the day, you know.
3) Dedication. Never missing a game. Never failing to show up. Giving it everything all of the time. If it's true that you get out of something what you put into it, then this is the only way to live. If you're going to do it, then really do it. If you're going to even get out of bed, then live out your day with everything you have.

Next year Favre probably won't be out on the field. The sporting world will continue without him, and will eventually forget him. But I hope that even as time goes on, you can see in me the things I admire most about him.