Touched by the Red Devil
Touched by the Red Devil
Photo by Randalyn Hill on Unsplash
The etymology of ‘passion’, and I am not talking about the word but the feeling that lead for this word to be coined can be traced back to the Biblical times. I am not religious, so I will not go into the whole concept of ‘suffering of Christ’ beginning from the Last Supper to His ultimate death by crucifixion. The intense feeling, most of us experience is mostly due to any societal defined reason or a strong sense of belief that is embedded into us through teachings and learning of the past greats thinkers and family tradition. A more sophisticated definition by Wikipedia, which I am not going to paste here, beats all the proverbial fun out of the term for people like us, called Millennial.
I, for one, have had interests in lot of activities ranging from arts to sports and then to more of academic natures. In last twenty odd years, I dabbled first hand into activities like sketching, painting, writing ,playing cricket, playing football(soccer) and then into more passive ones like following some talented musicians, artists, writers and sports personalities and franchises. Few of these have held on to the test of time. I think everyone needs music in their life, so when anyone is passionate about certain genre of music, that stays on as the base to which future taste in music largely depends on. I also believe, if you are passionate about playing certain sport that stays on with you even if you stop following the sport. The concept that baffled me was the passion few individuals have for sport franchises, may it be local or global, in different sports. To be clear, it baffled me at the age of fourteen, for a boy who was branching out his interests from playing one sport to watching an entirely different sport solely based on activities teenagers of my then age do on a playground or discussions that a bunch of teenagers have on daily basis. Every week that went by, the concept of following a sport franchise and yearning for them to do well so that me and my friends can enjoy emulating the skills of players and discuss fervently about the weekend game, became prosaic. The sport in discussion is football and the franchise is Manchester United.
Photo by Belle Maluf on Unsplash
I started following the football club at the age of fourteen when they were doing alright with some proper hard knocked footballers putting in a shift week in, week out. A manager who was a great reader of people and game and made managing the game and players look simple. I always believed that mark of a great personality is that no matter what that person did, made it look ridiculously uncomplicated. For a bunch of teenagers following the stylish players and a disciplined coach, it was a ideal philosophy to try to follow and emulate. I as an individual, playing regularly for school and a local franchise, was drilled by the coaches, with the notion to always play hard and fair, to enjoy your time on the field. As a teenager who was still learning the trade, the idea seemed simple enough but the execution always lacked conviction and so called grace. So, when I got to see first hand on my television screen, a live demonstration of those exact values, I got hooked to it, taking mental notes, integrating it into my own play. I tried to project the team’s attitude, relentlessness,discipline, hard work and fight into my play and in general life. I, very well knew, I may not possess that level of talent on field but the attitude and values could serve me well through out my life. I was lucky to enjoy the team play and celebrate the team’s glories with my friends over my teenage years.
Here I am, years later, now well into my middle years and doing well for myself, but the team I grew up following and supporting, no longer doing as well as they used to. The values which made them a success, squandered away for some commercial deals and glamour. The personnel on and off field in the past valued discipline and the love of the game over anything else replaced with egotistical, economically driven and self centered individuals barring some individuals. A club that is suffering because of its own success and struggling to get rid of the moss and replace it with blossoming, flourishing perennials. As I sympathize, I understand the decline and the mass frustration of people like me surrounding the whole situation of the club. I may not be able to fix it, but in all this there is one recurrent question I tend to ask myself, when did I go from supporting the values that the club represented to supporting the club regardless? Am I still a supporter of the club or just going through my emotions for the obligation of following the club for all the joy it gave me as a teenager and the years gone by? I don’t rule it out but as the weekend sets in and I grab a drink, cold or hot depending on the time of the day, and I sit in front of the television awaiting the kick off of yet another game, I tell myself, I will not let myself get carried away and enjoy the game for the leisure of it.The first set of skill or the first tackle my team does, the teenager in me wakes up and overtakes the sensible man and turns a leisurely watch into an intense bout of hope, fight of faith vs actuality.
There is no exact point of origin, may be a series of fortunate events, a sudden strike of lightning that ignited a strong sense of inclination, admiration, excitement, emotion towards an idea or a set of values or cause, personified by a Football Club, among other entities, may be that’s called —
Passion
Manchester United
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