Attacking Life

Back in High School I played football and one of my coaches called me to the sidelines during practice and said, "You know what Elliott? Your problem is that you try too hard."

I remember being shocked. How can you try too hard? I was giving everything that I had in a game where coaches demand 100%on every play. My coach was surely an idiot. And though he may have been right about my ability to play football, he was wrong about the approach to living my life.

I attack my job. I go about living it with everything that I have. I try hard, push boundaries and have never met a rule, practice or protocol that I didn't question. I go head to toe with politicians, clergy, business leaders and famous people whom I've met. I've declared war on poverty, homelessness, AIDS, broken health care and an array of other plagues in our community. I beleive that great things can happen even when I'm surrounded by others who tell me that they cannot.

I attack my life. As hard as I work is as hard as I can play. On occasion I find myself with Bill Berry or Mike Conner or Johnny O and Judy or my son Jeremy and we can blow it out as hard as a group of drunken Hell's Angels on meth! Sometimes it's healthy to just be a boy againand play hard, especially given my career in a world where everyone demands everything all of the time.

I attack my need for solitude too! I am a contemplative soul and like to stare at the ocean and remind myself of my place in the world. I like to sit in the Cafe Express and sip coffee and watch people walk through the squares of Savannah. I sit on my back deck with my bare feet propped on the rail and am reminded that I am comfortable in my own skin.

And I attack love too. When I give it away, I give it all away, holding little back for myself. Talking to my friend Bill Berry yesterday, he said, "You throw it out there more than anybody I know and you've never cared about hiding your emotions." Or as my friend Mary Ann Beil told me recently, "More than anyone I know you try to live the most authentic life." I took this an ultimate compliment.

I am passionate about my friends. Many often move on from my life as they come and go or grow and change, but I rarely close doors and am forever seeking out old friends whom I haven't talked to in decades.

During a wedding ceremony officiated by my friend Bill, he quoted James Taylor (along with Jimmy Buffett and Jesus Christ --- the 3 J's he said).

"Try not to try too hard, it's just a lovely ride." I love the song but always recoil a bit at the line.

At 53, I think that I'll keep living this life of mine the way that I have. It is the only way that I am comfortable doing it anyway.

And who knew that James Taylor could have been a football coach?