In 1985, between the births of my two oldest children, I had the opportunity/invitation to move back to Houston and work in the family business (bird's nest on the ground). My then- now ex-wife wasn't enthused about it even though we only saw her family once a year from our home in NC. I didn't push it. Four years later we separated. A year after than she moved (along with our joint custory) with my kids an hour away promising to only stay gone for two years. That was twelve years ago. I should have taken her to court to get her to move back but I didn't want to put the children through all that. I burned up the highways for about 8 years until my daughter got well into high school and had more to do with her friends than with her dad.
In 1995, I sacrificed watching the Rockets/Spurs series and the Rockets/Magic series so that I could go to Marine Corps Boot Camp. The last game I saw that season was Robert Horry's game-winning shot in Game 1 against the Spurs. Then I hopped on a plane and was dead to the world for 11 weeks. (This, of course, after I watched every Rockets game--no exceptions--for the past 3 years). About a month after the Rockets swept the Magic, I found out because my mom sent me a Houston Chronicles sports page in the mail. Okay, so in the grand scheme of things, not a big deal. But at the time, man, I was bummed to miss the greatest stretch of Rockets action in the franchise's history.
Couldn't you have just called your drill instructor and tell him you were going to be a little late and that it was no biggie?
I gave my wife my Dead ticket for the Deer Creek show. Thought to myself that I'd see them next time around. Then Jerry died. It ended up being their second to last show I believe (last was in Chicago IIRC).
The name of that band (remember this was nearly 11 years ago) was The Scraps. The show was "Good Night America" and was hosted by this guy..... The guests that week included Jackie Stallone, Dan Castallaneta, Tony Shahoub, and the reigning Miss Universe.
I've never sacrificed anything major for something else that I would regret. But, I did sacrifice nine months of my life for the Save Our Rockets thing. By the end of that, I was broke and exhausted, but I don't regret it one bit and I'd do it all over again in a heartbeat.
That was a well spent 9 months. I just found the bumper sticker I saved for myself the other day, from when I was helping pass them out in support of the cause. It's sitting right next to my Hakeem Bobble now. I had the chance to go on a national tour, as a soundguy, and live the life of the road for pretty good pay. My future wife had moved with me to Houston and there was no way I was going to leave her for that amount of time after she had sacrificed for me with the move. So I stayed and let someone else get the job. Haven't regretted it at all.
