Pick Yourselves Up and Play

Apollon Kalamarias had their day in court, as the saying goes, and they lost. Yes, its a shame. We would all –even many Olympiacos fans — prefer to see the Championship settled on the pitch, not in a courtroom. But that is not the world we live in. Olympiacos has been given the title, and that, it appears, is the end of the story.

Yet here come the reports of Rivaldo abandoning AEK to return to Brazil in a massive pout, of Zikos similarly refusing to participate in the play-offs, of Lyberopoulos whinging and calling for a team boycott of the play-offs.

Grow up.

Perhaps that was a bit harsh. I know the players are hurting, I know Rivaldo wanted revenge, I know Zikos and Lyberopoulos have been laboring for a long time against the Red giants and thought they deserved the title this year, finally. But it’s not just about them. AEK is bigger than this.

As this story has unfolded, two things kept coming to mind. The first was a quote:

“Ultimate failure does not come in the loss of a great goal, but in the loss of will to strive for another.”

There are many quotes like this (“The man of character finds an especial attractiveness in difficulty since it is only by coming to grips with difficulty that he can realize his potentialities.” -Charles de Gaulle), all giving voice to a basic, human drive. Great people, good people, don’t give up. They dust themslves off and try again. They don’t let rules, or courts, or referees, or corrupt officials, grind them to dust. They keep fighting, they keep striving, even if all they every do is appear to lose. Those are the heroes. Those are the players I want to cheer for.

The other item that kept coming to mind is a recent article I read by a child/adolescent psychologist. She was addressing the recent trend in the United States of well-to-do, academically successful, bright and promising twenty-somethings who are unemployed by CHOICE! These youngsters can’t seem to find work that is “fulfilling” to them. They leave jobs after a short period if they “can’t find themselves in their work” or if they are bored or unstimulated by their assignments. They are, to put a fine point on it, too good for work. The author attributed this trend to over-indulgent parents who, though they loved their children, did them and society immeasurable harm by teaching them that their career should be fulfilling, that is should be “their life’s work.”

It’s a cliche but everything good in life has a price, everything comes from hard work, and work is just that: work. We don’t call it work (labor, toil, exertion) because it puts a smile on our face, a spring in our step, adds years to our lives and makes us better looking. We call it work because just as often as not, it does the opposite.

I like my job. I don’t love it, but why should I? I love my wife, my daughter, my friends, Greek food and the game of football. I work, largely, so that I can enjoy those things that I like. I am fortunate to like my job. But I would be working even if I hated it. How could I not? How could I not work?

That is why I find these willingly unemployed twenty-somethings so shocking. How can they not work? How can they go to gym in the middle of a Tuesday and then our for drinks at night (as one ivy-league graduate featured in the article does) and not feel completely worthless, a failure, a disgrace to him/herself and his/her family?

Playing for AEK is one of those rare opportunities that God (or fortune, however you like it) bestows on a select few. You earn a living doing something you love. And at AEK you do it representing a club that is so much more than a sports club; its a living reminder of an empire, a faith, a diaspora, of hopes and trajedies older than any present day nation-state.

How dare they fly home to Brazil now? How dare they retire? How dare they boycott?

Shut up, pick yourselves up, brush the dirt of your jerseys and get out there and play.