The greatest column ever written, in my opinion, was one written in 1999 by Sports Illustrated’s Rick Reily. It tells the story of when Rick and his 14-year-old son were sitting in the grass and his son asked “Dad, why are we here?”
Reily goes on to talk about things like driving a ’62 Corvette and baseball at Wrigley Field. Fighting and friends. Fly fishing and elk hunting. Playing cards and playing hooky. Being present when our kid is the star of the game and especially when they aren’t.
How to curve a frisbee just right and do a one-and-a-half for our grandkids. Not here to work so much that we have regrets about time wasted. He goes on and on, but you get the picture; the meaning of life.
Then his son says, “No. Why are we here when Mom said to pick her up 40 minutes ago.”
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about my why: Why do I do what I do and why do you do what you do.
What gets you up in the morning? Is it a job or an obligation? Is your work here something that you enjoy, something that you look forward to?
Or is it something you dread? Do you work just to pay the bills? Do you work just to live or is work part of why you live?
I’ve been blessed in so many ways. I found work that is fulfilling, that I enjoy doing. There is nothing in the world better for someone like me than to be able to help someone past their injuries. For my entire adult life, I’ve wanted to be that person that provides the means to the end.
I’ve said before that I want to be there when you’re injured. I have confidence in my ability to stay calm and do the right thing. I also want the injured to look in my eyes and when I tell them that they’re going to be OK, that they know it to be true.
I welcome that responsibility. Some consider it a burden. I consider it a blessing. That is my why.
Why at my age am I still doing this? Why, after over four decades, do I still get up way too early (my wife’s words) and go do it again?
And why, after 35 years, do I sit down and write an 800-900 word essay every single week to fill this space?
To share, prepare, inspire, inform — that’s why I sit down every week, usually on Wednesday, sometimes on a Thursday, always in the morning, to fill a single page with words and then share them with you. That’s why I get up and go to work most every day.
It just seems natural to follow up these questions with the question of “why are we here?”
I could never be so eloquent or creative as Rick Reily so I never really wanted to try. But if I’m going to be true to what I stand for, if I’m going to stay true to why I write this column every week, then it deserves an effort.
To love. It is the natural state of things.
We don’t arrive here hating anything. We love everything and everybody. We learn to hate — it isn’t ingrained in us.
To serve. To provide for our families. To serve our neighbors, our community, our friends.
That’s it. It really is that simple. We just let life make it something else sometimes.
Joe Black, PT, DPT, SCS, ATC is a physical therapist and athletic trainer at Blount Memorial Hospital’s Total Rehabilitation. Write to Joe at joeblackdpt@gmail.com.
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