The grass is always greener in yesterday’s garden. Tom Brady is a miracle of modern medicine. He’s also a victim of ancient circumstance. After a remarkable return from reconstructive knee surgery, the New England Patriots quarterback very nearly regained his old form this season—which would be better news if “very nearly” met the exacting standards of seasons now long past.
Resilience means turning lemons into lemonade.
Realism, on the other hand, means admitting that all fruit tastes bitter compared to the sweetness of your first apple.
I’m not suggesting that Brady is washed up. His 2009 performance speaks for itself, and he’s likely to be a top Fantasy pick in 2010. But let’s not confuse Fantasy stats with actual facts. In a league where success depends so heavily on self-confidence, there’s no injury more devastating than the one that reminds a QB of his self’s expiration date.
You can’t unbreak a bone.
You can’t unburden a brain.
If there’s a moral to Brady’s story, it’s simply that mortal knowledge begins where physical innocence ends.
An athlete’s body is both his temple and his tomb. Wind sprints, weight sessions, weekly supply runs to GNC—they’re sacred rituals, rites by which jocks preserve their earthly grace. The catch, alas, is that altars of dust aren’t made to stand the test of time. Optimists will argue that Brady still has years of life in his legs. I’d counter that he should be far more concerned with the eons of death in his blood.
Stardom is good.
Stoicism is better.
Brady may never recapture his boyish magic, but at least he’s old enough to have lost his youthful illusions.
A mature man makes peace with his own perishability. To be young is to strive for masterful dominance; to grow up is to settle for managed decline. Tom Brady reached the end of the road 16 months ago, when he died to what he was and was born to what he’d always been. Every gimpy veteran longs for the dawn of a never-blemished Eden. The one who’s scheduled to sleep with a supermodel may yet learn to love the dusk of a not-so-blighted eve.
Bob Dylan never tore an ACL, but he does know a thing or two about limited recoveries:
Well, the emptiness is endless, cold as the clay
You can always come back, but you can't come back all the way
Which is a fitting dirge for a fallen hero.
Because some wounds are beyond healing, and any Son of Adam who claims otherwise is either on the business end of an arthroscope or only just saying, is all...