God made the world (or so it seemed to me in Third Line) and divided Mankind into those who were good at competitive sport and really interested in it, and those of us who were no good at all at sport and almost completely disinterested in it. Some guys made a God out of sport almost. I, however, was something of a sport atheist .
The daily humiliation of the very public Picking of Teams Ceremony when classes ended at 4 O'clock reinforced my detachment from organised sport. The best players would be the Captains, and they would pick their teams in descending order of footballing talent: ''I'll have Tigger. You can take Mike. I want Con. You can have Dida''. And so on down the ranks of players from the really good, to the mediocre to the pretty awful .
And then...to me. Medical experts call this (and I pass it on to you without a trace of self-pity) the Ugly Duckling Syndrome.
Years passed. Competitive sport became optional (Phew !) and in Poetry and Rhetoric, Joe Prendiville and I took to jogging every day up the Big Avenue, down past the post office on the road outside the College grounds and back in to school by the winding side avenue. God, how sweet a thing it was to be eighteen years of age with the heat of the sun on your face and the smell of cut grass filling the air, running up that long, long avenue with its magnificent trees swaying in the breeze and getting taller and taller as you neared them and receding again as you passed them by.
Somebody must have noticed us because in April of Rhetoric year, completely out of the blue, we were asked to represent the school at an athletics meeting in King's Hos in the 5,000m. Our friends thought this was hilarious. So did we, to be honest. But then we thought: ' Why not ? This opportunity will never come our way again. All that running must have done us some good. We weren't going to take it that seriously and anyway, what could possibly go wrong ? '
Maybe, I could put the Ugly Duckling behind me, and emerge, ahem, as an athletic swan, so to speak .
A hint of self-doubt began to dawn on the two of us as we got off the bus at King's Hos and met our opponents. They were preparing for the nationals, they informed us.
The nationals ? What nationals ? we asked mystified .
The Irish National Athletics Championship, they replied. Were we any good, they asked (a tad indelicately, I thought ), because timing was everything in their quest to qualify for the Championship. With the precision of synchronised swimmers in the Olympics, Joe and I looked at each other with raised eyebrows. On reflection, synchronised swimming would perhaps have been a better sport for us to represent CWC in. The thought crossed my mind that maybe the reason this honour was bestowed on us was because nobody else would do it. 'Aeterna non caduca', I muttered under my breath .
And boy, were these boy-racers serious ... they were Alfa-Romeo's and Lamborghini's to our Morris Minors. They were absolute greyhounds... and whatever about Joe, who was built like a whippet ... I was more akin to the English Sheepdog in the Dulux Weathershield ad on TV than any greyhound ... amiable and well-meaning, but essentially useless.
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| Photo @rgmcdermott |
The 'race 'started. I took up my usual jogging-down-the-Big-Avenue pace. The greyhounds cracked off at great speed and were soon on the other side of the running track to us. Joe pulled away from me to at least give the impression of providing some competition to them. After the first two laps, Joe had stretched his lead on me and was now on the other side of the track and the King's Hos boys were nowhere to be seen . Where could they possibly be, I wondered naively? My heart sank as the sound of their running shoes on the track behind me got louder and louder. Effortlessly, they cruised past me, and on to catch Joe. It was both funny and cringingly awful at the same time, and I was suddenly seized by an uncontrollable and entirely inappropriate fit of nervous giggles at the absurdity of the situation I found myself in. Giggling and running, let me tell you, are a bad combination
Public humiliation and complete physical exhaustion got the better of me I'm afraid, and before I could be lapped for a second time (and before I dropped dead), I dropped out. Embarrassed and ashamed at leaving Joe in the lurch like this, I stood at the side of the track to at least give him some moral support as he bravely battled on with that steely determination of his .
Joe as it turned out didn't want my moral support. As he came alongside me, and my mouth formed the words 'I'm sorry ', his mouth clearly formed the words 'you Bastard' back at me, then 'Traitor ' as he came back on the last lap
Long after the greyhounds had finished, Joe finally made it to the finishing line, his sporting honour intact. Mine was in shreds. Again. All was forgiven as we boarded the bus back to Clongowes. My day of athletic swannery was over.
Eamon Doohan OC'78
Email: Eamon.Doohan.Z00602 @ gp.hscni.net
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