No sir, when I told my dad that I wanted to play high school football he said I was young, dumb and stupid and that he was concerned about approving my request to play.
“But father, I am not afraid. I like the challenge. I like the contact.”
Apparently my protest was exactly the wrong thing to say because he told me that my desire to engage was precisely why he didn’t want me to play. It was because I had no fear or concern of getting hit or hitting someone else that he wouldn’t sign the release form.
Those of you who know me well might expect to learn that I forged his signature and went to play anyway. You might expect to hear the tale of how I became a high school All American linebacker and fullback but I am not going to share that story with you today.
Why?
Because it is just a story.
Instead I am going to tell you about how I became a Danger Man.
The Voice
The first time I heard the voice I was a 21 year-old man trying to drive my ’77 Camaro like I was on the Dukes of Hazzard or Burt Reynolds in Smokey and The Bandit.
It was a whisper at first that I could barely make out, so soft I figured I must have had the volume on the radio turned almost all the way off.
It got progressively louder and I began to wonder if the guys had hidden a tape recorder in the trunk or under the seat but I was too busy living the hard life of a college kid who had to go to the gym, fraternity parties and class so I just ignored it.
I thought about mentioning it to a friend but I didn’t want them to think I was any crazier than they already thought I was so I didn’t say anything. Besides I figured I was mentally strong enough to kill that thought, all I needed to do was focus on something else.
It didn’t work because the whisper was a virtual scream except I was on the only who could hear it. For a moment I considered headbutting a wall but in spite of my father’s concerns about my interest in protecting myself I had no masochistic tendencies.
Instead I did the next best thing, played two hours of basketball and helped the guys destroy a bottle of Tequila.
As you can imagine the voice didn’t disappear and neither did the hangover. But honesty dictates that I tell you that recovering at 21 was still much easier than it would be today and the best part was having a metabolism that could consume 98,000 calories per day and not retain a single one.
But I digress.
The 987,928 Most Dangerous Job
I rolled out of bed, grabbed a quick shower and spent some time reading the classified ads. That Camaro of mine was an awesome car but at 86 cents per gallon of gas it wasn’t cheap to run and that 21 year-old metabolism demanded to bed fed constantly so employment wasn’t an option.
It is a good thing I wasn’t holding a hot cup coffee because when I saw the ad for The 987,928 Most Dangerous Job I might have dropped the cup on myself.
Goddamn if that wasn’t what I kept hearing the voice talk about.
I read the ad, called the number and became a Danger Man.
Man oh man, if you only knew the stories. If we had the time I could tell you a tale or two. But the stories of my life as a Danger Man will have to wait for a bit, perhaps in a later post.
But I can tell you without question that we lived by Super Chicken’s motto, “You know the job was dangerous when you took it Fred.”
In Other News
If you remember my post about purchasing a FitBit I have a preliminary report to share with you about my experience with it.
Take a look at the graphic below and you’ll see some of the information the FitBit dashboard supplies you with.
I haven’t begun to use all of the functionality yet. I am not using the food diaries or recording my BP but I am recording how much sleep I get.
I expect as I get deeper into things I will add the food log but I didn’t because my focus in purchasing this was becoming more aware of how much exercise I was getting as opposed to how much I thought I was.
That is happening now and overall I am very pleased with how it is all going. To be clear, I never stopped exercising or working out but even Danger Men need to adjust their lifestyles to accommodate their current way of living versus how things used to be.
Lardavbern Now that is the sort of bubbe meise that keeps people up at night. 😉
Danger Man – huh. What does that mean? I am curious what you had to do.
I don’t know why, but the song Born to be Wild was playing in my mind the whole time I read your post:) Get your motor running….Cheers! Kaarina