I was feeling pretty shaky, a bit worn out and a bit beat from the rock going up hill and down, but I ended up at the club rooms and the sheds below and it got me thinking.

We’d walk in there half the Saturdays of every season, scrabbling, pushing, piss taking, boots on the shoulder, bags on the back. Inside something magic would happen, wild unfocussed boys being drawn in together, hierarchies of smarts and strength subsumed, power building, hope growing, we could listen, we could hear, we were in the moment, believing in each other, believing our coach when he would say we had something we could prove and we could help each other and we could trust each other and the only thing that mattered was that we committed, to the boys on either side, to the tackle, to the hit up, to the game.

No one remembers that we lost more than we won cause that was never the point we were just in it as best we could, for something to do but mostly for something and somewhere to be. A lot of the boys muddled and stressed in their real life, wonky parents, wonkier futures and yet here we were, being given a chance and some attention from some of the soundest grown ups I’ve ever known. Ones that might call you a fuckwit when you were a fuckwit but also ones that’d come and get you when the lights were going out literally and figuratively.

As I said I went down to the clubrooms today, old Lee Nelson let me in and we talked that the club was closing down, no more teams, not enough kids, demographics, economics, fears of the big hit’s. But he had some yarns and some laughs and it meant the world to grasp a little of the rarefied air before it’s all gone.

I’ve met a lot of folks in the creative fields with not much interest in sport, full contact ones especially and that’s ok but I know it saved a lot of lives and shaped so many more or gave respite, connection, community and offered a lot of wayward young dudes some real things of value and great worth and every now and then as ol’ Lee Nelson reminded me, the piss ups and the punch ups made for some pretty funny stories.

The latter you get to talk about forever and maybe a bit of a smoke screen for the former, that you didn’t need to talk about because its inside you like a ballast keeping you upright when it all looks shaky.

Thanks to Lee, thanks to the ol’ Saints, thanks to y’all for reading this far and coming to the show tomorrow! The tickets are on their last legs and that feels good so jump on ‘em if you haven’t yet, there’ll be a smattering of door sales but not many.

The band is tight and loose in all the right places (oh yeah did I say we had a band tomorrow? Yeah! We wanted to give these new songs a good honouring!) and spirits are high…so yeah so yeah so yeah tomorrow we’ll be honouring those spirits, hopefully your spirit, the spirits of all them old saints and everything else!

Thank you Thank you Thank you

For doing the yards with me!

Tomorrow night!

Tix:

Lyttelton Arts Factory doors 8pm music 8.30pm

Ps

Taupo

Gisborne

Napier

Auckland

You’re next!