Guest Blogging for Loaded For Blog
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I am guesting blogger on LFB (Loaded for Blog) this week - hope you enjoy it….
This is called:
Jesus Took the Wheel, One More Time
This one was different. This athlete, a superstar, had turned the self-aggrandizing world of sports figures lost in their own posses, mansions and decadent lifestyles upside down, inside out, and so ashamed of themselves, that the ripples will reverberate for ever afterward. John Doe, a six foot, eight inch Hispanic quarterback of unparalleled success, took the money - and didn’t run. Laying low among the cactus and dry heat of Phoenix, he took the money - AND HE DIDN’T RUN.
Instead, he built foundations; of homes, schools, rec centers and especially the “other” foundations, the ones that gave away hundreds of millions of dollars to build the former kind of foundations - to fund more state of the art schools, housing and rec centers, teacher education, adult training programs and so much more.
No, John Doe was no flash in the pan, Milli Vanilli lip sync. Doe walked that walk that he preached, and his programs gained steam. First in Arizona, then all of the West Coast, then the Great Plains, into the Midwest and finally across the whole of the United States of America, one success led to another, and the huge endorsement deals signed tripled, and then quadrupled from that. The insatiable drive to find more money, more programs, and the fantastically talented people who could make them happen, consumed Doe. He gained nothing on earth, but his heavenly Father just HAD to be pleased. Doe catapulted past Tiger in earnings and just humbly kept on keeping on. Each time, he rolled the money into a new altruistic venture, adding battles against illiteracy, poverty and crime to his charitable resume. All followed Doe’s own simple yet unlimited creed, “Give back more than you got.” His small home became a retreat, a haven, as new programs discovered and refined new leaders, baptized in a new form of capitalism, where they saw firsthand what success can breed, and vowed to do the same.
Doe didn’t feed them for a day, he taught them to fish, that they could then eat for a lifetime. The beneficiaries bought into his creed, and the pebble quietly shifting at the top of the mountain became an avalanche.
Another nice side effect, one of those lifelong ripples that are impossible to track, but affect generations, was that other athletes in the same stratosphere of earnings, the top 1/1000 of a percent, soon felt tremendous pressure, from fans, employers and endorsements, to step up and imitate Mighty John Doe. The pressure crossed fields and “the other light meat,” movie stars, joined in too. Some lead, some followed, and some just plain got run over, watching as those aforementioned ripples spread out from Phoenix to Philadelphia and Hollywood to Hell’s Kitchen.
A new generation of accountability was launched, and as life mirrors sports, it took effect even outside of the sports arena. The constant “it wasn’t my fault, I had no … ,” excuses got their just desserts and were exposed as cop outs, empty excuses for not stepping up and doing the right thing. Everyman, and Everywoman, got the message to live for others and our land of the free was reborn, truly becoming America the Beautiful; safe, modern, hard working and dedicated to being men for others. Poverty sliced in half, illiteracy virtually eliminated, free healthcare and a work force so energized and productive it made the Japanese model look like snails starting at the bottom of a mountain, with that avalanche still coming on.
Mighty John Doe played fourteen years in the NFL and eighty-eight years in life. He died at 12:01 a.m. on Easter Sunday. His legacy is firmly planted and flourishing beyond even his wildest dreams. He wasn’t undefeated, but Lordy, he was a winner. Some say, Jesus took the wheel one more time.
Currently listening :
Jesus Christ Superstar (Original London Concept Recording)
By Andrew Lloyd Webber
Release date: By 24 September, 1996
