I was never the quintessential athlete. When other kids were playing basketball, I was reading and playing video games. When other kids were playing outside, I was inside playing D&D. Most of my childhood was spent with my nose pressed against the TV screen or inside a book.

So when I started playing sports in earnest when I was sixteen, surprise surprise, I wasn’t any good. In fact, I was terrible. I can’t recall all of the times I was braziled, nutmegged, and bitch slapped in my first few seasons of club soccer. There were physical aspects to this inability. I wasn’t fast, quick, tough, durable, agile, coordinated, tall, strong, or graceful. In fact, I was quite the opposite. My grandma had put me in a few sports when I was in third grade (soccer, baseball, and one practice of basketball), but after that year we moved in with my dad and began our army base tour of the southwest.

The other side of sports is the mental side. Among this new crop of criteria to suck at, I found some serious deficiencies as well as some surprising characteristics about myself. First, much of sports is poise and composure. Some people call it clutch or choking, but in truth you can be as clutch as possible but just fall short on the odds and percentages. Regardless, with shaky knees and tight stomach, I found myself screwing up a lot in pressure situations and even more often when the cute girls or coach was watching. I had this uncanny ability to wreck on the easiest possible tasks, such as trapping the ball, in the most disastrous ways that normally involved me lying on my back unable to breathe.

But in that smoking ruin that was my athletic ability I found that I had energy. If I have one saving grace as sportsman, its my ability to run. I’m not fast at 100 meters or 5 miles, but I have the runner’s ability to absorb the pain and fatigue of constant action and keep going. In fact, I like it. Growing up as I did, you build a sense of pride over the suffering you can absorb and still push onwards. Maybe not upwards all the time, but certainly onwards. Couple that with my innate, family-inherited stubbornness and faulty sense of pride and I was the perfect “Charley Hustle”. I never made it to “Johnnie On the Spot” or “Dave Get All the Hot Girls”, which is a shame.

As I played more soccer, I found more situations to build composure and poise at the right times. I’d never say I was worthy of even a snapshot, but at least I’d have days were I dominated the other slow, white suck-asses. And then there’d be days where I should have stayed in bed.

I’m 31 years old. After being married for 3+ years and having a our first child a few months ago, I feel 37.

In particular, my knees are held together with bailing wire, duct tape, and prayers. Ever since I was a kid, I’ve had problems with them – tendinitis, arthritis, grinding, lateral tracking, etc. All of that leads to the fun symptoms – tightness, swelling, weakness, limited range of mobility, and pain pain pain ’til your daddy takes the T-bird away.

Now as I mentioned before, I’ve got the heart of a runner (though not the talent), so I normally just play through the aches and pains. I can assure you of three things that I continually must relearn each time I play. Playing past the ever shortening limit of physical activity only results in greater pain, longer recovery, and terrible embarrassment on the pitch. It kills me when younger players run by me because my knees just do not have the strength to keep up laterally anymore.

For the past few weeks, I’ve set my mind to get back in shape. Here’s the rub – I’ve got a broken/sprained wrist on my right hand that pretty much eliminates any upper body work, a recurring pinched nerve in my back that shows up more often than my father-in-law, previously stated knee problems, chronic shin splints in my left calf, multiple nagging injuries in my feet from broken toes and bones, exercise-induced migraines, and a groin tear from seven years ago that has never healed ( … yep … because I never stopped playing on it).

I just can’t will myself into fitness anymore because my body breaks down in the first week. Which means I have to play the old man game of dieting and light exercise. This is harder than you think when you’re juggling a 10-week old boy, house renovations, and the lot. I’m becoming resigned to the fact that I’m going to be a fat, fat man. Cue Jethro Tull song here.

Every person comes to point where they realize that their golden years are behind them. The shine of youthful vitality has disappeared and I’m left with ever increasing body hair, moles, and silver highlights on my temples.

I’m ailing. I’m old. And it sucks.