Musings from the Shitter – Volume Eleven

Watching the Game

So yeah, this week’s musings didn’t come from the shitter.
They came from the sideline.
From grief and mud and the aching quiet of not playing.

From three weeks of nothing...no boots, no bruises, no lungs burning in the cold.
Just space. Time. Too much of both.

From a Saturday watching my wife play her sport, with something heavy in her chest and still move like hell wouldn't catch her.
From netball that doesn’t ask for softness, doesn’t let you hide...and from the sideline, where I saw other footballers like me
grasping for a different kind of fix.

Maybe we were all out there trying not to miss the game so much we forgot to see the beauty in just being near it.
Maybe we were learning how to show up, even if our names weren’t on the team sheet.

And from a Sunday, watching Feilding’s women play the kind of football that lights a fire in your gut.
Ninety minutes that reminded me the game’s still alive...even if I’m not in it right now.

And maybe that’s the whole damn point.
Not just to play. But to feel. To witness.
To love this thing...even when it doesn’t love you back in the way you want.

Because whether it’s your wife burying grief in hard cuts and sharp passes,
or your daughter on the sideline yelling like she scored it herself,
or you, just standing there in the bright cold,
trying to remember what it means to be part of it. 

It’s still the game.

And we’re still here.

Even if we’re not on the pitch.

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