{"id":3045,"date":"2012-08-09T12:37:58","date_gmt":"2012-08-09T16:37:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.broadstreetbelievers.com\/?p=3045"},"modified":"2012-08-09T12:41:51","modified_gmt":"2012-08-09T16:41:51","slug":"the-death-of-garrett-reid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/?p=3045","title":{"rendered":"The Death of Garrett Reid"},"content":{"rendered":"

I will not be arrogant and say “you have to be a parent to know what it must feel like to lose a child” because I think that\u00a0to discount someone’s empathetic perspective is flat-out ignorant.\u00a0 However, just speaking for myself, I can absolutely say that, before the birth of my first child,\u00a0I<\/em> did not have the same level of sympathy and understanding of the pain for a parent who has had to bury a child as I do today.\u00a0\u00a0Maybe it is because of this still-fresh emotion I have or because of the closeness to home with which the Garrett Reid death hit me (our <\/em>long-time football coach at a funeral service in Broomall attended by 900 people, including Roger Gooddell…), but this story has really evoked a level and depth\u00a0of sadness in me that few sports\/news stories have been capable of doing.<\/p>\n

I did not know Garrett Reid.\u00a0 I do not know Andy Reid.\u00a0 I doubt that I even know anyone that knows anyone in the Reid family, despite growing up in the next town over and attending neighboring high schools.\u00a0 But, sports have a funny way of making us feel awfully close to total strangers.\u00a0 We don’t ever really get to know film actors because, well, they’re always acting.\u00a0 And, when we do see their true human sides, it’s usually because they did something disappointing or offensive or stupid.\u00a0\u00a0As for\u00a0musicians, we may know some of their inner thoughts or deepest secrets through their lyrics, do we really feel like we know<\/em> them?\u00a0 Do we\u00a0feel like we have joint experiences or are we just acutely aware of their <\/em>experiences?\u00a0 And, then there are our politicians, whose whole career is based around the majority of people feeling like they know them, and yet, they may be the most distant<\/em> of anyone, when it comes right down to it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But, sports figures are out there.\u00a0 They bleed, sweat, and cry in front of us.\u00a0 Their rejoicing is a matter of public record to be replayed over and over again on SportsCenter<\/em>.\u00a0 Their interactions with teammates, coaches, opposing players, fans who love them, and fans who hate them are all dissected and analyzed under the intense media microscope on which everyone is to draw their own judgments of the individual people they are.\u00a0 And, we believe in them; we celebrate their successes right along with them; and, we feel pain when they feel pain.\u00a0 For many of us, some of the most important moments of our lives are also the most important moments in our favorite athletes’ lives.\u00a0 Chase Utley’s “World F*cking Champions” speech felt like it was said to me directly.<\/p>\n

So, when something happens like what happened to the Reid family over the weekend, we feel it.\u00a0 Genuinely and legitimately.\u00a0 And, this was one of the worst things that can happen to a person.\u00a0 You always hear things like “burying a child is one of the worst things a human being can endure” or “when you have a child, all you think about is the life they may lead, the successes they may find, the triumphs they may realize, so, one day, for that all to be taken away is almost too much to handle” or “your one job as a parent is to protect your child from harm, so when harm finds them, you cannot help but feel like, somehow, you’ve failed.”\u00a0 Well, when my child was born in October of last year, these sentiments immediately turned from cliche to gospel.\u00a0 I am not saying – in any way<\/em> – that the Reids have failed or that they will not be able to handle this in time, but what I am saying is that, deep down, there is a part of them feeling that way right now, and just the thought that someone feels that right now hits\u00a0me with\u00a0a raw, empty emotion.<\/p>\n

I don’t know the answer to all of this – I don’t even know why I felt the need to write this.\u00a0 But, what I can say is that I wish there was something someone could do to alleviate the suffering felt by the Reid family right now because I can only imagine it to be a suffering that takes one to the brink of total emptiness and despair, and no one should have to go through that kind of\u00a0agony.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Our thoughts are with you, Reid family…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I will not be arrogant and say “you have to be a parent to know what it must feel like to lose a child” because I think that\u00a0to discount someone’s empathetic perspective is flat-out ignorant.\u00a0 However, just speaking for myself, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[12,4,1274],"class_list":["post-3045","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nfl","tag-andy-reid","tag-eagles","tag-garrett-reid"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3045"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3045\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3055,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3045\/revisions\/3055"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/broadstreetbelievers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}