Savouring that magnificent moment before the end of innocence
It was 1978 – Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours was Album of the Year; Record of the Year was the classic, Hotel California, by the Eagles; and the movie, The Deer Hunter, was released, which would go on to win five academy awards the following year.
Forgive me, this blog was supposed to be about the 1978 World Cup, but allow me to meander slightly off topic for just a while.
I will pick up the World Cup thread in Part 2 and 3 as I focus the viewfinder of memory on 1978 – a year that proved to be both influential and foreboding in shaping who I am today.
I was new to football. I had previously only played a few games at school – no boots (for obvious reasons) and, to lessen the pain of kicking the ball, I played by fitting two or three socks onto my stronger right foot.
Three local clubs in the area – St Athenians, Magnolia and Mowglies – amalgamated to form one team: Factreton United. In 1978, I was in the club’s Under 14A side, and it was to be the year that sealed my love for football. It was what I wanted to do…
The sheer, cathartic release of playing, the camaraderie of teammates, the thrill and excitement of victory, and the gushing anticipation ahead of the next fixture. Everything else – the hardship and oppression – could be, temporarily, put on hold.
I didn’t have to worry about anything – not the violence at home nor the agony of apartheid’s vice-grip of subjugation – I could simply immerse myself in football. It was the balm to soothe the terrors of a young teen struggling to make sense of the insane world into which he had been born.
It was a time of friendships and teammates, a time of innocence, a time of uncomplicated wonder…
But it was also a time to walk that fine line between this naïve, childhood existence and the ugliness of the real world that was patiently, painfully, waiting around the corner.
It always reminds me of the concluding line from Rob Reiner’s outstanding 1986 film, Stand by Me, one of my all-time favourite movies: “I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was twelve. Does anyone?”
It’s about the loss of innocence as you slowly gain an understanding of the world, that you are but a speck in this cruel, callous cosmos we call earth… that there’s a harshness, a sadness, even a brutality, to being an adult that one is never, ever, prepared for.
A humanity that crushes the spirit through avarice, ego, arrogance and narcissism…
A world that unabashedly celebrates the vast chasm between rich and poor…
An unkind life that demolishes optimism as it relentlessly kneels down in supplication to the pompous pursuit of money, crass materialism and hubris.
It was 1978 – and, as happy-go-lucky as we were in that Under14A team, we were never really ready for the grim reality of the real, grown-up world. Is anyone?
Rodney Reiners 