By MONTE DUTTON

Friday night at Wilder Stadium was a game-time decision. Fortunately, I was good to go.

Back-to-back night games are tough on a body, particularly one that got bowled over at Paladin Stadium on Thursday night.

I saw the receiver, moved clear, and a television cameraman backpedaled into me, and down I went.

Hank Williams Jr. sang that “the hangovers hurt more than they used to.” I can’t remember the last time I had a hangover – imagine that? – but I can report that a fall hurts more than it used to.

Hell, my back was already aching a little when I got there. I’d slept wrong on it. That happens more than it used to. I’m satisfied I looked a lot like Tim Conway in the old Carol Burnett Show as I trudged up the stadium steps to the press box right halftime. The muscles, what remain of them, in my lower right back, were jumping like Michael Jordan. I matched my year-to-date total in involuntary grunts and yelps.

It was after midnight when I got home, turned on the laptop and used a belt to keep a cold pack in place. Going through the photos, writing and laying out the story of Furman’s 45-10 triumph over Tennessee Tech kept me up painfully till 4 a.m.

When I awakened, I’m sure it took five minutes to get out of bed. I felt about as capable of working the Newberry-Clinton game as I was playing in it, which is to say I thought I had no chance.

I watched the replay of the Furman game, partly to see what I had missed from being there and partly to make sure my spill wasn’t captured by the cameras. It wasn’t, thankfully, and to the best of my knowledge, I haven’t showed up on Instagram … yet.

All day long, I kept one cold pack on my back and another in the freezer. When one thawed out,  I’d put it in the freezer and strap on the other. I made a miraculous recovery. The night air of Wilder Stadium – and a 42-7 Red Devil victory – combined with the healing hands of time and ice. After the pregame drills, I was fully capable of adjusting a zoom lens and pressing a button with my index finger.

I even slept well after I hit the rack at 5 a.m.

Now, if I had a lick of sense, every time I have such a stupid misadventure, it would remain a matter between me and the Lord (along with social media, of course).

But no …

I couldn’t wait to tell everyone I encountered how hapless I had been. I was the pied piper of self-ridicule at Wilder Stadium. And here I am, writing about it the next day.

As Cousin Minnie Pearl used to say, “I’m just so proud to be here!”

Football in Laurens County is caught between the Devils and the deep blue sea, this because the Presbyterian Blue Hose aren’t playing in far Kentucky until tonight. In between are the Laurens Academy Crusaders (1-2), the Thornwell Charter Saints (0-2) and the embattled Laurens District 55 Raiders (0-3).

And as Lefty Frizzell used to sing, “I’m an old, old man trying to live while I can.”

I wonder if every man watches the youth, throwing and jumping and catching and pushing and tackling, and remembers what that feels like, back from when George Washington was skipping silver dollars across the Potomac and terrorizing cherry trees.

Then the old man talks to the lads and their mentors, trudges back to the truck and thinks, It’s so ridiculous.

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Many of my books – 12 of them, in fact — are available for sale through MonteDutton.net. In particular, I recommend my latest novel, The Latter Days, which is about baseball, and a fair amount of it is set in a town that might seem familiar.