Never believe in mirrors or newspapers. – Tom Stoppard
Being in the spotlight can be a dangerous thing that can slowly grind people down until there is quite simply nothing left.
I say this after reading about the former footballer Paul Gascoigne. “Gazza”, as he is better known, was arrested and sectioned under the Mental Health Act after he was said to be acting as a “potential menace” at the Malmaison Hotel in Newcastle.
Gascoigne was a talented player but with that talent came responsibility and that appeared to be something he could not handle. A cruciate ligament injury in 1991 kept him out of the game for nearly two years and he struggled to regain his top form before he retired in 2004.
He was rarely out of the headlines due to his exploits outside of football. Drink and family problems plagued him and in more recent times he has not been in the spotlight. I have often wondered that for all the madness that fame can bring, do people miss it when it is taken away from them.
The general consensus about Gascoigne is that he does not handle boredom well; he has to have something to do. The press had stopped writing about him and to the outside world it looked like the offers had dried up.
It’s sad that the “demons” can win and that there are those who will never get back what they once had. I think we all need some sort of stability in our lives or something to make us a little grounded and down to earth. Fame, looks and money will all eventually run out and as the old saying goes “you can’t take it with you”.
I genuinely hope that Gascoigne can recover and find a way out of his problems, perhaps the first thing he has to realise is that the past is gone and will not be coming back.
Thursday, February 21st, 2008 and is filed under Thoughts & Questions, Views on News.
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