The Man in the Park
It was a hard day.
I felt like I was running out of time, out of energy, and maybe out of chances. Everything felt stuck — the job search, the recovery, the pressure. I sat alone in the park, heavy with the feeling that I wasn’t getting anywhere. I didn’t plan on being around people. I didn’t want to be seen.
But life had other plans.
Written by David - inspired by true events on a 93 degree day in June.
(Contact: davidisraelmd@gmail.com)
Scene 1: The Road
The sun hung heavy over the path, painting the pavement in waves of heat.
It was 93 degrees. Quiet. Still. Too still.
Then a shape.
A turtle, small and alone, just feet from the edge of the road. Not moving.
David slowed. Crouched. Waited.
I think its dead, he thought.
It got so close.
Okay. I’m a member of an organization called Friends of the Champ. It’s an organization that I started with five other people. It’s a group that tries to raise money for homeless fighters—boxers from the past who’ve had a lot of their purses taken away from them and are now living on the streets, living in parks, living in apartments... well, were living in apartments—they’ve just been kicked out of them because they don’t have rent money.
Okay, this I’d like to call “Don’t judge people harshly until you've seen them in different circumstances.”
Okay, this is story about people that don't ever forget what got them there. And it's about a success story that started on a small scale many years ago.
I used to watch baseball games that my son played in, next to a man who said to me one night, he says, “Listen. What are you going to be doing next week?”
And I said, “I don't know.”
He says, “Are you near Madison Square Garden at all?”
And I go. “Not right now. It's just but I go down there once in a while.”
Okay, when I retired, a boy that I had coached was working for Morgan Stanley and he asked me if I wanted to go out to Arizona to coach a team that he was on. There was a 40 and over-year-old team of you know former players from college and high school and stuff like that. So, I went out there and I went out there a second time after that. But I was getting used to the routine of going out there and the following year he asked me if I would coach an all-star team made up of Legends from the past. So, I said, “Sure that sounds great.”
Okay, I was a coach for many years out in the Long Island area and I learned a lot coaching all that time but one incident really sticks out in my mind. I had gone to a clinic and heard a man say this and I carried it on when I was coaching.
Letting go of a best friend. That’s the kind of thing that hits you like a punch to the gut.
It’s like your whole world suddenly gets a little smaller. And the inside jokes, the 2:00 AM, the endless trips to Starbucks that somehow always end up at a Target.
Suddenly, those things feel like a treasure from a different lifetime. It’s wild, too. You never really think you’ll have to let go.
That friend that is supposed to show up for you at 3:00 AM when your life is falling apart. The one you talk to about everything and about nothing.
Summer vacation as a kid – it was pure magic. No school. No alarms. Just the sweet freedom of doing whatever the heck you wanted.
I remember the first day of summer break. It was like the whole world was yours. You’d wake up late. You’d eat cereal in front of the tv, like it was your job, and then make the bold decision to go outside and play.
No plans. No schedule. Just the general vibe of “let’s see what a day takes us.”
You know there’s a moment like a switchboard in your brain that you realize: you are done. You are so done. You are so done with shrinking yourself for anyone.
You spend too much time people pleasing, biting your tongue, and making space for everyone else’s opinion.
But now, now, you’re like “nope.” Nope. I am putting my foot down. I matter just as much as anyone else. And you feel it in your soul. The power that comes from speaking your truth.
You can literally feel the universe backing you up. Like “Yes, keep that energy.”