Christian Living

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Larry Lilly's Letter Friday January 27, 2006

I set to thinking the other day. This scared the Great Blonde and she called the Prayer Chain and in short order the 'thinking spell' came to a halt. You would have to walk several miles in her shoes to understand the devastation wrought in years past due to yours truly pausing to ponder.

However, as I thought prior to the intervention of well intentioned saints, the phrase, "Riegels Christians" kept floating in and out of my mind.

For the sake of younger specimens among the readership, I was thinking of California's Roy Riegels. Roy Riegles holds the honor of recovering a fumble in the 1929 Rose Bowl and taking the ball to the one yard line. California was playing Georgia Tech. Riegels got confused in the melee for the fumble and ran 60 some yards the wrong way, being tackled on his own one yard line. When California punted, the punt was blocked in the end zone by Vance Maree of Georgia Tech, thus giving the Rambling Wreck an 8 to 7 victory via the safety. Over the years, Mr. Riegels took a lot of ribbing and was the butt of many jokes, receiving enough upside down cakes to start a bakery, and even received offers of marriage on the one yard line. He handled his misguided jaunt with aplomb enjoying the celebrity that came with the mistake.

Roy appeared at numerous events and was even given an Honorary Letter from Georgia Tech University. On this occasion he said, "Believe me, I feel I've earned this."

What's to learn from Roy 'Wrong Way' Riegels?

Learn to see the humor in your mistakes. Most people in the heat of the moment have made mistakes and an admission, a refusal to place blame on others goes a long way to help others get over it, though Roy said it was Stumpy Thomason's fault as Stumpy was the Georgia Tech player who had fumbled. Stumpy shot back with, "Heck, I feel like I made Roy Riegels famous." This attitude is more effective in overcoming a serious mistake than the most often used "if only", "No one understands me", etc.

Learn to turn around when you realize you're going the wrong way. We used to call this repentance, but this idea of repenting, turning around has fallen on hard times in religious circles, rather we look for some genetic disorder and place blame on some ancestor.

Learn that real people who have been in the heat of battle have made some seemingly goofy mistakes also and if you quit whining they will line up and be your friend. Joan Rivers call this procedure her, "Oh, grow up!" sermon.

Anne Morrow Lindberg who knew a little about pain, wrote:

"It takes as much courage to have tried and failed as it does to have tried and succeeded."

Larry Lilly Copyright © 2006 Use with credit

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