Irony

Yes, I need to write more. I have posted once since February and that was a fuckin' re-post. Whenever I'm asked why I'm not really writing anything, I always explain that nothing's really happening in my life. Well, the same may be true now, but why does everything have to be solely about me? I mean, there's other shit going on in the world, right?

Saturday: I'm watching a college football game, and in the postgame interview, I shed a tear. In my 34 years, 2 months on this planet, this has never happened concerning a sporting event. Did my favorite player break a longstanding record? Did my precious UNH Wildcats upset a powerhouse? No and no. To be honest, I don't know one player on either team, but both teams know Jasper Howard, and they're both playing for him that afternoon. Honestly, neither team really cares who wins the game, because Jasper Howard is the only thing on their minds.

After a win over Louisville the Saturday before, Howard opted to spend his Saturday night going to a dance. Standing outside the student union, Howard suffered a stab wound to the abdomen and was pronounced dead on his way to the hospital. He wasn't trolling the streets and it wasn't 3 AM. It was a University sanctioned event, for Christ's sake! Is there anything more benign than a college dance?

So often, you hear about athletes that survived in tough surroundings in their adolescence, only to go to college locally and stick around with the same shitheads that made their life more challenging in the first place. Ultimately, these guys move onto the pros and terrorize other people (see Jones, Popeye and Artest, Ron) or animals (see Vick, Michael). Well, Howard grew up in Little Haiti, a borough of Miami. Now, I've never been there, but I don't think a white guy from New Hampshire would survive long. As difficult as it was, Howard opted to move far away from home, leaving his mother and sisters behind. His plan, after being the first in his family to go to college, was to work diligently, enabling him a career in pro football and a way to get his family out of Miami. This was all he wanted.

I wasn't there. I don't know what happened. Maybe Jasper Howard reverted to his roots and started the skirmish. Maybe he said something that would qualify as threatening. And maybe, just maybe, the knife wielding assailant will proclaim that he was defending himself, and maybe he was. None of that matters now. Jasper Howard is an example of what we should be. He took his lot and tried to squeeze everything he could out of it. On the Saturday following his death, the University of Connecticut was playing a road game at West Virginia and nobody cared. Everyone in the stadium was more interested in letting Howard know they were thinking of him.

Jasper Howard was imperfect. It's what he was dealt. But we should all have a little of him in us.

Jasper Howard (1989-2009)