LOL...Easiest question ever ...lol... I don't know about that...
I don't know if this is the easiest question I have ever had to answer ... There are many nights I don't even know why I play pool , And then the nights were I'm never gonna play pool again . Then there is the nights were you can't miss and everything comes easy . People look and stare at you and you hear them whisper at how good you are. Nights when you make those three rail or four rail kick shots look routine and nights when you look like a rookie missing a straight in shot 12 inches from the pocket. It is a game no one can master and many have tried. It is a rewarding game and also has taught me almost every aspect of life in my life.
Humility when you lose to someone you should beat all night long ... Patience when your playing the guy that takes one hour to look over a straight in shot . Pride in your game and how well you play it ... Honesty to be able to play the game fair. Compassion when your cheering for the guy who should not have a chance in the world to beat a good player but makes the eight to win and follows it in only to lose a second later or the guy who lost all his money to you and don't know what he is going to tell the wife and kids. There is so much more this game has taught me it has brought me many riches and friends that no money or mansion or expensive automobile could replace. Nights spent sleeping in a car with friends miles from home ... Holidays were you wake up broke and gather what few dollars you have and head to the pool hall and play and walk out with a nice little purse for your effort and the holiday cheer ... Survival in getting out of some of these place once you have won , You learn to love and respect the game when one of your close road friends dies and his family buries him with his cue laying beside him and the next trip out and every trip after it everyone in the car talks about how much Lee would of liked to be right here sweating out all of these matches we are going to hook up with... These are some of the reasons I play and why I choose to step into the arena every chance I get ...
But the main reason I play is because of a older man I met when I was 15 who loved the game. He was a mechanic at a gas station across from our house. One day a mustang pulls in and two women jump out topless, of course my 15 year old raging hormones had to go over and check it out . I spent that day talking to the older man who was in his fifties . That night he took us out to Mcdonalds and then he went to play pool and I saw my first glance of the game I would fall in love with. Rex was the older man's name and he taught me all he knew about pool . I became like a son to him and we would go play every night.My parents were not fond of Rex when they found out he was taking me into bars to play pool. I remember one night my Mom came in and pulled me out of the bar threatening to have Rex locked up . I also remember setting in a biker bar one night and playing and one of the guys walked by and told Rex ... Hey that prospect you got there is starting to play pretty good before you know it he will be beating you... That is when I knew I was learning the game and improving.
We would travel and we had road buddies we would ride with Lee was one of them . Woody was another and Woody was good , real good. I don't know how many nights we spent watching him play and sweating out matches. When I went into the Navy about once a month I would get a letter from Rex telling me about where they went and how well they played and asking if I was finding any action. When I got out I was right back in with the boys and we were on the road again. I remember the night we stopped up in Orange County and played all night . We did good that night and decided to get a room ... That next morning when Rex , Woody and I got up to move on to the next town ... Lee never awoke it seems a blood clot had killed him that night and we all returned home very sad.Lee was burried in Arlington cemetary in Riverside California with full millitary honors. The only blood family he had there was a Uncle who lived with him when he was home. We were his real family and what I guess you could call his imeadiate family. He was burried with his cue by his side it was a sad day and it seemed like every time we hit the road after that someone thought about Lee and how much he would like to be here with us ... Heck he was probably still right there with us. Lee was dead at the age of 41 for many years I feared the year I turned 41 wondering if I would live to see it ??? When it arrived I spent alot of time that year thinking of Lee he was the ladies man in our group . He was a ex-marine and the tough guy that kind of looked out for me the youngest . I remember one night a guy got mouthy and Lee busted a rack of balls with the guys head. Rex was like a father to me , Woody was the one we all relied on to get our money back when we got in over our heads he was our stopper or shortstop. Lee was kind of like my hero and now Lee was gone at the age of 41... It really shook me up and hurt me and as many things do in the world of pool and the lives we live playing this game it has stuck with me all my life.
Rex as I said was like a dad to me and he taught me all he could but experience was my best teacher and it is pathed with many harsh lessons. Lee and I were very close also it took me some time to start to get over his death I was playing very bad and losing and people were talking about my game and that I must be strung out to be playing so poorly and my mind was not in the game at all and I was very frustrated with the game at that point in my life . Thinking is that the way I would die in a hotel room miles from home after spending the night with a bunch of drunks and druggies sweating out bets and playing to get money to eat on. I was about to give it up till one night Rex asked me out to the pool hall to play and talk ... When I went home that night I found a old piece of paper in my cue case and on it Rex had wrote these words...
"It is not the critic who counts, nor the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause; Who, at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement; and who, at the worst, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat."
~President Theodore Roosevelt
That piece of paper always seemed to find it's way to me in my worst moments ... When things were going bad on the table ... It always found it's way into my case ... And it always worked to motivate me to get my game back and to continue to play when I wanted to give it up... To me those words sum up why I play pool ... And why I love the game.
I was 28 when I moved to Georgia ... Rex stayed in Southern California with his wife and kids. Woody had moved to L.A. and was still playing strong . I was 30 when I had my son and put my cue up in the closet a fairly new Schon R-11 with dashed rings ... I had struggled for 18 years to raise my son on my own after his mother decided she did not want anything to do with our son he was only 4 months old then and she was not ready to raise kids. When he was 18 he was ready to move out on his own and while cleaning out the closet I came across my old cue and all those memories ... When I opened it there was the old piece of paper Rex had wrote the words to "The Man In The Arena" on ... I knew then seeing my job was done raising my son to at least manhood it was time to return to the pool table and the only real life I have ever felt comforatable with ... Rex and I stayed in touch till his wife died and I have not heard from him since ... I still like to think of him as the Kentucky Hillbilly he was, propped up on a wall in a pool room smilling with cue in hand waiting for his turn to shoot ...
I now have a new crew I run with the names have changed Danny , Wesley , Johnny and Andrew and me ... They mean just as much to me as the first crew did ... We all hit the road together looking for games ... But time has a way of changing things and I'm not the kid anymore ... I'm one of the older players in the group now and the kid is 19 year old Andrew. While traveling the road I listen to Andrew talk with all the enthusiasm of how he is never gonna stop playing the game for anything in this world and how he wants to go pro... And I remember back to the days when I was younger and telling Rex coming back from a Vegas trip almost the same exact words... And I tell Andrew sometimes life just gets in the way of all those pool plans ... I hope you do what makes you happy.
Yep this is pool and this is the cycle that seems to be a part of it and that repeats itself over and over . I'm not alone I have a whole family of pool players stretched across the planet who share very similar tales. I could go on and on and tell everyone stories of some of the nights we spent out on the table , the craziness that went on . The things we accomplished , the closeness we shared but this is already very long and I apologize to you for that. So I'm only touching on a few of them here as all of you know . These tales are my treasure chest that is burried in my mind that I have lived and experienced. You can't get this setting behind a desk filling out forms or punching the clock at 7 in the morning. You may gain financial stability and all that goes with it but you will not have lived life as fully as I have had the chance to ... The way we as pool players have been given this great gift and this beautiful game and all that goes with it the good and the bad.
So you say it is a easy question but I say to you it is not a easy question because when you ask it ... It brings back my life story and all those involved along the way who taught me to play by giving me advise , giving me lessons on the table by taking my money and leaving me broke , all those who's money I took . All of the good times and all the bad times all the friends I have made and all the friends I made that are no longer here. It is a game that gives and a game that takes when you can least afford it too ... Now a days I find myself still very much in love with the game ... I'm passing it on to my son finally and teaching him to play and he is hooked , He has moved back in with me with a wife and kid I'm gone most nights anyway . I don't know if I can give you a direct answer as to why I play but your a player yourself and I'm sure that your story is alot like mine . And between us we both know why we play ... Because there is no other game like it and when you start your hooked playing a game that is impossible to master and can give you the thrill of a lifetime or leave you feeling the worst you ever felt ... Pool is my life it is what I always go back to time and time again just like that old piece of paper that has found it's way into my case on more then one occassion. When I step to that table with cue in hand I know I am the man in the arena .... I know the great enthusiasms ... And I know the great devotions ... I know that if my time comes and I'm in a hotel room miles from home after sweating out the action the night before in a dark bar room and I don't wake up ... That I died happy and like my friend Lee died doing what I loved doing my whole life ... And I know that our place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat."
That is why I play the game ...
