Athletics

You may wonder for how long and for what reason Mickey wanted to better himself physically and athletically. You may figure it has to do with his father's encouragement. That ship has sailed.

His father did teach him how to play golf but I would imagine it was to afford more opportunity to belittle him and try to control him with humiliation.

He could prance around with his son as a trophy. However, that did not work very well because I don't think Mickey was more than an average golfer.

For his whole childhood, Mickey always scored low in any of his athletic or sports endeavors. None of us knew why he couldn't catch the ball when it came toward him.
It dropped in front of him or behind him. It never landed in his glove.

When the ball was thrown to him, he missed it every time. When he stood at bat ready to hit the ball pitched to him he swung the bat with great hope, only to miss it, as they say, by a mile. He struck out every time. Now I know why, he wasn't interested in playing softball in our lot across from our house.

I'm wondering if any of you have figured out even before Mickey did what could possibly be the problem. His first reveal which was quite stunning, occurred when he was taking a test to be able to acquire his license. There was a picture in front of him with two trees near a car. His task was to tell which tree was closer to the car.

The way he perceived the picture was that both trees were equidistant. You may have an inkling what the findings will show. When he was in college it was confirmed for him. Maybe some of you guessed it. He lacked depth perception. He wanted to sign up for the Roxi program.

He hoped to join the reserve officer program where he could be an air navigator guiding the pilots. He was disappointed when it was confirmed that he did not have any depth perception and would not be suitable for the program.

Yes, it's depth perception, an important part of his vision. It would help him see objects in three dimensions and understand how far away they were. It is very clear to me why he could never catch the ball.

We didn't know why he couldn't catch a ball that came flying at him. I'm sure he wondered why he continuously missed the ball. He must have felt like a failure all of the time which is probably why he shied away from playing games where a ball was moving toward him. He was expected to make contact with the ball using a bat or his foot in kickball.

Everyone's judgment arousing puzzlement could then be wiped clean, especially for his father. I suspect at that point his father didn't care. He'd kind of written Mickey off as it was.

I'm not so sure Mickey cared either because I think his father's rules, regulations, and expectations had gotten old. I don't think Mickey cared to please his father anymore anyway.

He did become a good pool shark. He had great enjoyment with some of his pool buddies. Around the '70s he joined a group called Marble Valley Ridge Runners.

He made many friends in that group and was inspired to continue doing well. There was no criticism only encouragement coming from the group.

They would gather in Amherst, Massachusetts to run either a 5K 3.1 mile in length or a 10k measuring 6.2 miles. He laughs to think that sometimes in Rutland they would gather at a location across from the hospital.

This reminded him of the delusional idea he had when he was at Lewis Bay in his TBI treatment. You may remember when he was out exercising learning to walk, he got the idea that would be a great plan.

A boxing ring could be established for matches to occur near the treatment center. If anyone sustained a head injury, especially a TBI in a brutal knock-out, the staff members could just wheel them over to the Treatment Center.

This same amusing scenario occurred to Mickey when he was lining up at his starting block waiting for the gun to go off. He glanced across the road to spy the local general hospital.

Where he stood at the ready, would be a perfect location to schedule the runners to gather to begin and end. Any runner or spectator calling for medical attention would be right by the hospital and could be zipped across the road for any emergency services.

Another great idea coming from Mickey's kaleidoscope mind.

He may not have been making high scores in athletics but he certainly was getting high scores in school. He didn't have to do much of anything to learn what the teacher was trying to convey.

With his ADD, Attention deficit disorder he didn't present well as far as paying attention in class. However, he mysteriously scored A's on his tests. Even with his TBI, he is extremely bright and doesn't hesitate to remind his sister of that.

Back in the day if Mickey got an A his father rewarded him with quarters. Mickey walked away with many quarters, one for every subject.

Despite the behavior and symptoms of his ADD and his HA Hyperactivity Activity, the teachers liked him. They considered him a likable fellow. Is ADD since his head injury is over the top he can maintain a focus for about 4 minutes and then he switches to some other shiny object.

Sometimes in high school, he did become too disruptive which caused the teacher to dismiss him from the classroom to the bench outside in the hallway. He was unable to sit still or keep his mind on things.

When he was in the lower grades he had many friends. He didn't ever seem to get bullied like many in his neighborhood did. He knew to stay under the radar enough to never stir up any potential disruptions.

The only place he might have gotten into fights was in our neighborhood where we had many fistfights, and rock-throwing at each other. Even that activity occurred in friendly fun.