My wife, she still gives me a hard time, and says I hunt too much or I like to play golf too much. And she’s probably right, but it sure beats some of the things I used to do.
The town, the team, it’s a family. That has helped. For some people who have had to deal with some of the problems I have had to deal with don’t have football as an out.
I consider myself more of a loner now and I think when you get older, especially in this game, and just talking with other players who have come and gone, I see what they were saying when I was a young guy in the locker room.
And having a strong family, you know we’ve lost some members of our family and had some setbacks, but I think a good family and kids all those things I thought at one time… you got to be kidding me… Those things are so important they enable you to go on.
In the NFL a lot of times everyone gets caught up in the business side of things. For them it’s all about money and it really leaves a sour taste in your mouth.
It’s not so much about killing an animal, it’s being at peace and you don’t have to worry about all the other things that go on. That’s a couple of hours a week that you get to escape but it’s nice to do that.
I’m thankful for all the things that this job has given me and my family. But probably the thing that I am most proud of throughout my career is that, not only myself, but my family and the people around me have just been regular people, which we are.
You can lose a game but, I see guys every week including myself, you lose a game, it’s a tough loss, you’re down, two weeks later you forgot about it. You know it’s amazing how down you were, but all of the sudden you’re like it never happened.
Initially, I know that I handled it worse than she did and I think partly because I’ve always been… every bit of adversity I’ve faced up until the last year and a half is adversity I brought upon myself – or the opposing teams have given me.
God, he deals you blows that at sometimes you think you can’t handle and in the last year there have been things that we thought we couldn’t handle but we’ve dealt with it up until this point.
With each game I play, with each season I play, I’m running out of chances. You’re never guaranteed next year. You’re never guaranteed the next game. You have to seize the opportunity when it’s there in front of you.
Well even before she was diagnosed with the cancer, I would have said that she was a lot tougher than me and most guys would probably say that about their wives and it’s probably true in most cases.
