Who Is James Conner?
Foreword: I am tasked with answering the question, “who is James Conner?” I would normally decline this assignment, as I don’t know him directly. But thanks to his amazing write-up, “Nothing Is Guaranteed,” and my recent experiences, I have enough to show my relationship to him, at least as much as anyone else who doesn’t know him directly. If you only have time to read one piece, read his, not mine. James Conner’s frank deatiling of his experience is amazing and I thank James Conner for opening up during one of the most vulnerable times a human can endure…
It is last Sunday morning…
I am at a sports book in Lake Tahoe, Nevada. Craft beer pint in hand, I walk through the large room showing screens of men getting sacked, men taking huge hits to the chest, one man gets a helmet-to-helmet hit and passes out for several heart-stopping seconds. On several of the 52 televisions, James Conner has just scored his first touchdown of the season. My dad is not here, but we are excitedly texting about the progress of this second-year NFL running back, who played for the Pittsburgh Steelers after going through a tumultuous college career at nearby Pitt.
It is 2015…
Sensational collegiate running back James Conner has just had his season cut short with a torn MCL. While being checked out in the hospital, he is diagnosed with Hodgkin Lymphona, a cancer that has a 15% fatality rate.
It is still 2015…
My dad has just been diagnosed with prostate cancer, a cancer that has a 60% fatality rate at the severity and age relative to my dad.
It is 2014…
I’m at a huge, multi-day party for the members of my video game clan/charity drive group. I have just cooked up and served a batch of my super-hot “murder wings.” I am among a pack of large, adult men passing around a gallon of milk and crying. My sinuses are so wide open, an anaconda snake could pass smoothly up my nose and out of my mouth. Some of us are holding hands and giving each other encouragement, “you can do it! Just fight through the pain! This can’t kill you!” Eli, known to our video game club as “Big Sexy,” comes out of the bathroom, holding his crotch. He walks through the large room of crying men, men who feel burning in their mouths, burning in their sinuses, burning in their eyeballs for several heart-stopping seconds, and painfully declares, “DO NOT HOLD IT WHILE TAKING A PEE! OH, MY GOODNESS, DO NOT HOLD IT WHILE TAKING A PEE!” We laugh and embrace him, huge tears flowing from our bloodshot eyeballs.
It is 2012…
Huge tears are flowing from my bloodshot eyeballs. I am walking through the emergency room of Huntington Memorial Hospital, on the way to see my newborn twin sons. It is 3 AM, and the emergency room is full of people holding wounds wrapped with towels, blood red stains slowly spreading. At the check-in counter, a disheveled woman screams at the nurses to bring her to her husband. The nurses, dressed in identical scrubs of baby blue, attempt to reassure her that her husband has, in fact, not been admitted to this facility.
Blood red and baby blue.
Their assurances do nothing for me, as I am not in control of the situation.
I ignore this. I have an even more difficult walk to take, one through the neo-natal intensive care unit. Out the doors and up the stairs to the NICU. There is a large room filled with plastic incubators built for the recovery process of babies born extremely early. They’re called “micro-preemies.” I take my three-times daily walk past the plastic boxes containing sick babies, abandoned babies, one baby has several organs literally on the outside of his body. I arrive at my sons, born at 2 and 3 pounds, lying motionless in their tiny boxes.
I have no control over the immediate future of my babies. I can’t even place my hands on them, except for five minutes each hour. I arrive at my 2-pound son, Malcolm. An inexperienced nurse had been tasked with sticking a line directly into his arm veins. He has six separate puncture wounds on his arm from her failed attempts. He passed out for several heart-stopping seconds. Spray spots from the misplaced needle punctures dot his masculine-themed blanket…
Blood red on baby blue.
Their assurances do nothing for me, as I am not in control of the situation.
It is last Monday…
I am watching my five-year-old twin sons play an incredibly imaginative game they made up called “Pokemon Rock-Paper-Scissors Tag” in the backyard. Laughing, they leap over rocks and tree stumps trying to place their hands each other.
It is 2012…
I am watching my newborn twin sons in that large room, lying in their untouchable plastic boxes. I am hoping they one day will have the ability to skip around, laughing while playing tag.
It is 2032…
I am watching my five-year-old twin sons chase each other around the backyard, wishing the impossible wish that this memory wasn’t locked in the past. Wishing the impossible wish that I had been able to let go and enjoy it in the present, without being tainted by memories of the past and ironically-yet-unformed memories of the future.
It is August, 2018…
My father and I have co-written an article that has become Football Absurdity’s most popular piece of all time. I text my dad the news. He is happy. He caught the prostate cancer when it was the size of a pinhead, and had all his plumbing removed as a precaution. He is exercising maximum carefulness.
It is last Sunday…
I am sitting in a large room at a sports book in Lake Tahoe watching James Conner score his second rushing touchdown of his first starting game. I text my dad. His cancer has progressed into his bones. He has about six months left to live, or as he puts it, “one more regular season.”
It is 2016…
James Conner is undergoing intensive, painful chemotherapy. Eric Berry, a fellow high-performance football player and cancer survivor, gives him a warning Conner will take to heart:
“Your pee will be bright red.”
The nurse comes through the large room. Curtains separate various cancer treatment patients. She passes by “a little girl… a teenage boy… a 90-year-old woman.” She checks her chart to figure out who is James Conner. Finally, she arrives at Conner’s curtained cubicle. Her appearance shocks him:
“She had a long baby blue bodysuit on, big blue rubber gloves, and a blue mask over her nose and mouth, right underneath her eyes.” .
She assures him it won’t hurt
It does hurt.
When it comes to cancer, everything hurts.
Bright red and baby blue.
Her assurances do nothing for me, as I am not in control of the situation.
It is one hour ago…
I am in the Wal-Mart. Through choking tears I order a shot of fireball whiskey, extremely hot. I ask for whatever disposable electronic cigarette they have. She looks at the display of cigarettes and announces they only have one.
Flavor: Cherry red
Brand name: Blu
It is several hours ago…
My friend Eli was hit by a blue SUV running a stoplight, He is dead. They assure me he wouldn’t have died if he had been wearing a helmet.
Blood red on metallic blue.
Their assurances do nothing for me, as I am not in control of the situation.
It is next Sunday…
Every fantasy football fan now knows “who is James Conner.” My dad and I sit in his trailer watching Conner, or Eric Berry, or any of the other sports stars who beat cancer (but not Lance Armstrong because he sucks). Even though we are past looking to them for inspiration, they now provide an equally important role in helping us through the journey into death, be it long or short: They give us relief.
It is 1985…
As a young boy, I become obsessed with writing comedy when I realized that, no matter how preoccupied with grief someone is, a properly crafted joke can cut through those emotional layers and provide relief in the form of laughter.
It is every Sunday of Fall 2018…
Fantasy football provides a similarly abstract-yet-effective relief. No matter where we are in our lives, we can take a moment on Sunday to forget about reality and live in the fantasy world of arbitrary sports statistics. It gives my father and I, who were never particularly close, a chance to spend one joyous day each week together. It gives me a chance to bring my five-year-old twins, around whom my dad’s entire life now revolves, over for a visit.
So, thank you, James Conner. Your chronicalling the harrowing journey for cancer treatment has brought inspirations to thousands, but for me it’s brought even more benefit. I’ll never again wonder, “who is James Conner,” he is a symbol, a beacon.
He is a champion at life.
For more articles like “who is James Conner,” where Evan Hoovler takes a normal assignment and makes a really weird article, check out these links:
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