Of Biografias and Autobiographies: The Football

Hello everyone. I am a football. A used, injury-ridden football. At present, I am at the retirement stage and as if right on cue, my creators have started looking for a substitute to be used in my place. Someone told me about the concept of “Autobiography”, about how we can recount our personal experiences and sometimes even our entire life. So, before I get dutifully kicked off and fate, in the form of my creators, interferes and decides my life, I would like to present football as viewed from the eyes of the “Ball.”

“Football” is called the king of sports, although in my entire life, I have not understood who gave the concept of 22 players toying with an innocent, rotund thing the sobriquet of “King?” From the time I was born (or created), till now at the retirement stage, all I have endured is kicks and butts in every nook and cranny of my body. You humans may argue that a ball is a sphere, it has no edges and all the geometry that you have learned, but we have feelings you know! The idea of kicking a poor defenceless “Non-living thing” (as you call us) might be fun in your eyes, but for me and my extended family members (the so-called spheres that you use in other sports), it is pure agony.

Try to imagine my plight. From here to there, from this post to that, I am mercilessly prodded, without any interest from my side. Not to mention, when one of those 10 “Idiots” puts me past the cage you refer to as the “Net” and the 11th idiot guarding me from it, everyone erupts whooping with the ecstasy of a five-year-old. And then, the person who was firstly responsible for throwing me into the net, grabs me and kisses me. Oh! His audacity! If I had hands, I would wrangle his throat without any pang of guilt affecting me.

Wait a minute…I almost forgot…there are these people known as referees who are positioned there to look after the proceedings. They act as the law too, in case one among the 11 injures or trips another from the other 11 lot. They mete out punishments also. Weird, isn’t it? Here I am tossed around like a dirtbag without a merest passing thought about my health and the people who thrash me get the most pampering. What shameful bias!

You know, I suffer from a medical condition known as “Acute Vertigoisis” wherein the patient feels constant sense of jolts and movements, irrespective of whether he is moving or not. It’s not an uncommon disorder among us footballs but my doctor tells me that in my case, it’s quite advanced for my age. And considering the age of footballs, I have not yet entered my teens and I can fall dead to the ground at any time. Outrageous! I sometimes feel, what if I hadn’t been a soccer ball? Would my life be better then? Unfortunately for me, I don’t know the answer to my own questions.

Towards you humans, I don’t bear any malice and completely appreciate you guys loving the game. But I just would like to add, next time you watch your favourite player pin me (or my substitute) to that wretched net, spare a kind thought in our direction. After years of entertainment and servitude, I guess we owe at least that much from your side.

And a final parting shot to my whole bunch of related footballs waiting to be bounced. This is one mistake you will regret for the rest of your living life. But at the same time, I also know that you didn’t choose your future any more than I did!