A True Man is a Born Loser

Loss is a part of life. Loss and failure, which is just another form of loss, a loss of hope or worth, are what make victory and success that much sweeter. Everyone experiences both throughout his life, though the man who is ambitious, who is always pushing and taking risks with the hope of grander rewards and sweeter victories, will experience more losses and failures; this is especially true for men who pursue life with passion. The more passionate you are about something the worse it’ll hurt if it fails, when that passion is destroyed in the bitter fires of defeat. Caring about things undoubtedly leaves you open for hurt and the more you care the more hurt you risk bestowing upon yourself. Sometimes you almost feel envy for the level-headed, uncaring people who live their lives in eternal control and without wild, unfettered passion.

I write this today with a sour stomach, a mental, psychic, and physical hangover having taken me to numbing depths of misery after my Baltimore Ravens’ tragic loss to the Patriots in a game we’d all but won. As I write this, feeling so goddamn depressed that I want to crawl into a hole with a bottle of Wild Turkey and call if a life, I can’t help but realize how stupid it all is, which makes me feel even worse. While yes, I consider myself a hardcore fan, and I’ve already written about what that means and made somesense of the phenomenon of fandom (in which we cheer for a group of people doing their job with no real connection to us other than the fact that they perform their job in our city of choice), it’s still baffling that I should feel so wasted, so down and depressed, over something as trivial as a game.

I’m no stranger to loss and failure, either. At the ripe age of 30 I’ve already been involved in an executive capacity in 3 failed start-ups, not to mention the countless blogs, books, websites, and small companies (anybody want to pay for a personal lacrosse tutor for their kids?) I’ve overseen and organized, all of which have also effectively “failed” (though a few I might consider more “not succeeding” than “failing”).

And then there’s the real, one true loss, loss of life. Over the last decade I’ve had two good friends die, seen the death of every relative in my grandparents’ generation, seen a few family friends from my parents’ generation, including friends’ parents, die,  and had people whom I emulate and admire (Norm Webb, my lacrosse coach, a war hero, high-ranking member of the military and also one of the greatest men I’ve ever had the fortune to know; Hunter S. Thompson, a personal literary hero) fall into death’s icy clutches. In the last year alone both of my wife’s grandparents died as well as our dog (who’d been hers for a good 12-13 years) and our cat (who’d been with her for 15 years). 

And then there’s the friends with whom we’ve lost contact, almost the same as dying though with a remaining (though dwindling daily) possibility of reconnection. And the friends who are dealing with their own struggles, who’ve lost certain elements of their personality, whether to mental issues or addiction or other vile plagues, who run the very real risk of losing themselves, and thus us losing them, within the near future.

Then there are the losses of luminaries like Steve Jobs, young inspiring athletes like skiers Jamie Pierre and Sarah Burke, talented artists like Heath Ledger and Amy Winehouse, things like this which cut short the amazing contributions these people had the potential to continue making to the future of mankind.

And yet in spite of all this, I feel like a lead musket ball’s lodged in my chest, my stomach at this Ravens loss, I feel more grief than I did for a lot of the above very-real losses and why? Because some guys I never knew didn’t put a piece of leather across an imaginary line more than some other guys I never knew? Grow up.

But then what does it mean? Back to the fan question. We are fans because it gives us some sort of connection to something bigger than ourselves. We sacrifice our Sundays for months – because, at least for me, a Ravens game essentially ruins my ability to do anything on those most sacred of days off – spend money to buy t-shirts and jerseys, not to mention the thousands of dollars we spend in drinks and food at the various bars where we have to go to catch the game, all like some sort of bet that the team we back will not only fulfill some emotional connection but also emerge victorious, allowing this support to qualify us for celebration alongside our team. So they lost. So what? There’s always next year. Albeit Ray Lewis will be older but he’s got at least one more season in him. And Ed Reed – hell, he has to have one more good season because he only showed up for half of this one. And Ray Rice, yes running backs have limited careers but he’s goin’ franchise, baby. Suggs will hopefully step up during the off-season and get over the dismal performance he put on after Ray Ray returned, Ball So Hard instead of Ball so Soft. And pretty much everybody else is in the primes of their lives and careers.

For me, it feels a bit like a marathon runner who ran 25 miles and then collapsed, so close yet not across the line. If we’d won I could’ve rested for the next 8 months, a winner, without having to anticipate the next chance like I am now (and we looked so fucking good! This was our year, who knows what might happen next year – Indianapolis knows what I’m talking about).  Last night I said I felt like I wasted all that time and emotion this Fall. But during the weeks it was fun, it gave me something to break from my routine, something to look forward to which didn’t require too much money or effort. Especially while we’ve been having such an abysmally snow-free winter in the mountains. There’s a certain gratification to care about something so frivolous and that’s the beauty of it all – the loss hurts but there’s always a next game, another chance, and hell, it’s not like anybody died. Some dudes who get paid millions of dollars to exercise and play games for a living beat some other dudes who get paid millions of dollars to exercise and play games for a living. The pain I feel now is irrational, especially compared to that very real pain of death, estrangement, and personal failure. Which is great. To feel a real emotion without any REAL consequences. In a week it’ll be like I never felt this bad. Actually, maybe it’ll be two. I mean fuck, this was the season we beat the Steelers TWICE!

I have a friend who told me that he knows a woman who in her 40's found out she had breast cancer, fought it, and won; a year later her daughter was diagnosed with cancer, fought it and lost. He said that whenever he feels like he's in a horrible situation, whenever things get bad he thinks of that and it immediately helps him put his own troubles in perspective. I mean, when you look at it that way, it shouldn't matter one damn bit that a bunch of dudes wearing tight pants and gates on their heads lost to a bunch of other dudes dressed similarly but with different colors. Perspective.

We lost. And it hurts, hurts so goddamn much. But anybody who doesn’t know loss is somebody I pity because without loss victory isn’t as good; without failure we don’t learn. If there was a man who’d never known the painful sensation of loss, I’d pity him because he’d probably be one of the most boring,  joyless people on earth.  

So I guess the point of this is to accept the loss. Stew in it a little. Breathe it in to let you know you’re alive, that you can feel things; that in this increasingly detached life, feeling something, even if it’s misery, even if it’s irrational, is better than feeling nothing. If you're gonna try and get the most out of this short life, you'll experience a lot of loss and heartbreak. Embrace it. Because without the sour, nothing would be sweet and certainly nothing worth having comes easy.

Though it woulda been nice if Lee Evans had caught that pass or Cundiff had made that goddamn field goal.

- Ryan