A Thug's Game, Played By Gentlemen

The beauty and danger of the game: it rarely stops. Life's a metaphor for rugby.

I remember my first tackle. I'm 35, the point at which everyone younger than me becomes a kid, even if they're technically not. This is my first real match. We are the Old Aztecs. But you'd never know it by looking at me. I've been training for weeks, I'm in the best shape of my life, 175 pounds, most of it muscle. I'm not as fast as I once was, but I'm quick enough, and I can run for hours. I'm at Inside Center (or, if you prefer, Centre). My job is to get the ball, advance it, pound through whoever gets in my way, get the ball out to my wingers, who per my coach are fast, and who will score tries. As I'm hauling ass up and down the field, creating space, shadowing my opposite, my eyes follow the ball and my brain whirrs, processing the game, which hasn't stopped. Run, pass, keep the ball alive. We're playing a side from San Diego State. The Much Younger, Faster, and Leaner Aztecs. Kids. Not that it's doing them much good. Our forwards are grizzled and wily and tough and they are dominating the SDSU pack. The two packs are colliding, smashing together (to the uninitiated, this called a maul - the guy holding the ball is borne up by his teammates, and they all surge forward like a Roman phalanx, and the opposite team's pack swarms together and meets them head on, pushing with shoulders, arms, legs) and there's a yell - "BALL'S OUT!!!" - and all of a sudden my opposite's charging right at me, the big white ball tucked under one arm, the other extended straight at me like a battering ram. This will be a joust, of sorts. He's grinning. Just as his hand is about to introduce itself to my face at a 4:40 clip, I drop my shoulder, surge into him, wrap him up with my right arm, and drive him into the grass. In that moment, I see the surprise in his eyes. I'm an Old Guy. I shouldn't be able to do this. The sun is blotted out by our teammates - the packs collide above us, because in rugby when you're tackled the ball's still live, and both sides can and do battle for possession - and as he rolls and another one of his mates scoops up the ball, he taps me on the back. "Nice hit."

"Ok. Who can tell me what a scrum is?" I didn't really expect an answer. I'd had them running for a good twenty minutes, it was chilly, dark, and they were already thinking of hot cocoa and a warm bed. That they'd gone this long without the whole practice deteriorating into a game of Grab-Ass was something of a miracle. 6 year old boys have the attention span of...well, 6 year old boys. Of course mine spoke up. "A scrum is when everyone kind of makes a big hug and then you push the other team out of the way and then one guy gets the ball and passes it to another guy, or maybe he runs with it, or maybe he kicks a goal." I nodded. "Good! Now, you guys aren't going to be doing scrums at our games on Saturday" - from the group arose a collective and disappointed "Ohhhh..." - "but let's practice them, because I want you guys to understand that this is a big part of rugby - working together with your teammates." And then I walked them through the scrum-building process, wrapping their arms around each other just so ("binding"), telling them what each of their scrum duties were. And then I coached and watched them, moving together, talking to each other, and always remembering to push forward. 

I remember the first time I got tackled. Same game. Same guy. If this were any other sport, I'd say he was out for some payback, or looking to salvage his pride, but this is rugby, a thug's game played by gentlemen. During those long and grueling hours of practice, I did what I always do when engaged in sport - whether it's climbing, surfing, or merely just going for a run, I always strive to understand it, to ask myself "Why?" and to answer that question. Plowing full-speed into tackling bags, racing down the field calling out passing plays, trying to perfect my drop-kicks (in vain - despite the ball's size and watermelon shape, kicking a rugby ball accurately is notoriously difficult, because the goddamn thing moves like a knuckleball in any sort of breeze) - I loved doing it, but I didn't really get why. And then I'm in the game, and I'm charging down the field screaming "BALL! BALL! BALLBALLBALL!!!" at my teammate, and suddenly the thing's in my hands, and there's the try line, and the next thing I know I'm on my back. I heard myself being tackled. I didn't feel it, which is odd. I exhale, inhale. The sky is blue. There's a white ribbon of cirrus clouds. The beauty and danger of the game: it rarely stops, and if you don't go with it you're gonna get trampled. I'm up on my feet, and I'm sure I'm smiling like a maniac. After the game ends, both teams gather together around the grill and the keg, because ruggers are a bunch of crazy motherfuckers, because you kind of have to be to play, and that transcends the uniform. And I get it.  

The boys played their hearts out on Saturday - we were a couple of kids shy of having a full side, so the other team's coach let us borrow players. Everyone ran, passed, stumbled, went the wrong way, threw the ball out of bounds, laughed, cried, scored, failed to score. It was a jubilant mess. When the final whistle blew, the kids shook hands with each other - there wasn't a keg, of course, but there were orange slices, and the kids were eager to talk to each other about what they'd all collectively done, and of course along with rugby, there was Bakugan and Beyblade and the new Tron movie, all topics of importance. I grabbed my phone to check messages - Beth and Zoë were at home, and I wanted to see what the lunch plans might be. And then, of course, I had to do my victory Tweet, to tell the world of the great victories that my little rugby club had achieved. I read through my Twitter feed, and clenched my teeth - there'd been a shooting, in Arizona, a bunch of people, a Congresswoman, a nine-year-old girl. Some crazy asshole with a gun. Again. 

"Dad!" I looked up. Lucas and some of the boys, from both teams, were trying to put together a scrum. "Can you help us?" I stuffed the phone in my pocket and jogged over to the pitch. The boys were doing well. Their arms were locked around each other, crouched, eyes up, ready to go, to hurl themselves at their imaginary opponents, to take whatever the invisible other team cared to dish out. This, I thought. "Ok", I barked, trying to sound like a coach. I'm sure they heard me smiling. "Everyone together! Stay tight! Push forward!"