I do not know why finding out that Donald Trump played high school soccer bothered me so much. But maybe I can figure it out.
I do not want that xenophobic little sh*t to have enjoyed a thing that I loved as much as I enjoyed it. It's kind of like how we want our athletes to be upstanding citizens, models of what human behavior should be, only the exact opposite. I want people who so utterly disgust me as people to not like the same things I like. Or, at least, to not be good at them. This is why I took so much pleasure in Cory Gardner (who seems like a much more normal, non-crackpot person than Trump) sucking at high school football and so much pain in Trump's soccer career — even though we don't know much about said career.
OK, that last part was melodramatic. "Pain" is a categorical overstatement. But it bugged me.
Like, if this person had some of the same experiences I did and turned out to be and absolute maniac, is there a chance I could turn out that way?
Maybe I just don't want Donald Trump to be a normal person (at least in some small part of the fabric of his being) with normal human experiences.
Actually, it's probably this question: what if Donald Trump was a better soccer player than me? We don't need to get into the specifics of my career, just know that it could be described with adjectives like "fine" and "decent." What if I'm less athletic than a person described by my favorite sportswriter as a "vulgar talking yam"?
Yeah, that's it. I don't think I could live with myself. Fortunately Trump played way back when the U.S. still sucked at soccer (like, really sucked), so I'm sure I was better. There, now I can sleep tonight.
I also read a thing in which one of his former (baseball) teammates said he could have been a professional athlete, which I'm choosing to ignore, filing it next to that "healthiest president of all time" garbage. I've heard he's pretty good at golf, though.
You stay the hell out of my sports, Donald Trump.
Contact The18 Staff Writer Sam Klomhaus at Klomhaus@The18.com or follow him on Twitter @SamKlomhaus