Sports metaphors are so common that I think we take them for granted. “It’s a slam dunk,” for example. However, I’m glad that life isn’t always like a sports game.
If you’re standing in a long line at Wal-Mart, you don’t want a stripe-shirted supervisor to announce, “time out!” and abruptly close down the register. Imagine a school district instituting a policy that requires all students to work at the same pace. Every morning the teacher would pull out the yellow flag – “No speeding up, kids."
You ask your daughter to take out the garbage… but half an hour later, she appears to be wandering aimlessly in the backyard. “I’m running out the clock,” she explains.
Then there’s the worse case scenario—you’re in the middle of a delicate procedure and your surgeon becomes exhausted. “Time to take a knee!”
I think many of us sports fans would agree that some of the less notable moments take place when the yellow flag appears in racing or a football player takes a knee. And heaven knows, minutes turn into hours when there’s a closely contested basketball game. In real life, we play by rules, true enough, but sometimes we have to adapt them to particular situations or people. On occasion, we might even throw the rules out. Life’s just too complex to be reduced to a sporting event. And I’ll admit it, I’m glad that in the game of life, we can’t literally foul out. There are always second chances.
I’m Lori Drummond-Cherniwchan and that’s my Perspective.
