My Life on the Line: How the NFL Damn Near Killed Me and Ended Up Saving My Life

Author: Ryan O'Callaghan
Publisher: Akashic Books
ISBN: 1617757705
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 161

Book Description
A riveting account of life as a closeted professional athlete from gay NFL player O’Callaghan, against the backdrop of depression, opioid addiction, and the threat of suicide. “[O’Callaghan’s] story is one of beautiful vulnerability, and it further shows the importance of knowing you aren’t alone.” —Oprah Daily, recommended by Gayle King Ryan O’Callaghan’s plan was always to play football and then, when his career was over, kill himself. Growing up in a politically conservative corner of California, the not-so-subtle messages he heard as a young man from his family and from TV and film routinely equated being gay with disease and death. Letting people in on the darkest secret he kept buried inside was not an option: better death with a secret than life as a gay man. As a kid , Ryan never envisioned just how far his football career would take him. He was recruited by the University of California, Berkeley, where he spent five seasons, playing alongside his friend Aaron Rodgers. Then it was on to the NFL for stints with the almost-undefeated New England Patriots and the often-defeated Kansas City Chiefs. Bubbling under the surface of Ryan’s entire NFL career was a collision course between his secret sexuality and his hidden drug use. When the league caught him smoking pot, he turned to NFL-sanctioned prescription painkillers that quickly sent his life into a tailspin. As injuries mounted and his daily intake of opioids reached a near-lethal level, he wrote his suicide note to his parents and plotted his death. Yet someone had been watching. A member of the Chiefs organization stepped in, recognizing the signs of drug addiction. Ryan reluctantly sought psychological help, and it was there that he revealed his lifelong secret for the very first time. Nearing the twilight of his career, Ryan faced the ultimate decision: end it all, or find out if his family and football friends could ever accept a gay man in their lives.

Life, on the Line

Author: Grant Achatz
Publisher: Avery
ISBN: 1592406971
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 434

Book Description
An award-winning chef describes how he lost his sense of taste to cancer, a setback that prompted him to discover alternate cooking methods and create his celebrated progressive cuisine.

Life on the Line

Author: Philip D. Chinnery
Publisher: St Martins Press
ISBN: 9780312025991
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 256

Book Description
Pilots relate their combat experiences in Vietnam with tales of bravery and sacrifice, demonstrating that pilots were engaged in combat as often as ground troops

Out of Line

Author: Barbara Lynch
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1476795444
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 304

Book Description
Blood, Bones, & Butter meets A Devil in the Kitchen in this funny, fierce, and poignant memoir by world-renowned chef, restaurateur, and Top Chef judge Barbara Lynch, recounting her rise from a hard-knocks South Boston childhood to culinary stardom.

Life on the Line

Author: Faye Wattleton
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780517467497
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

Book Description

Life on the Color Line

Author: Gregory Howard Williams
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1440673330
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 314

Book Description
“Heartbreaking and uplifting… a searing book about race and prejudice in America… brims with insights that only someone who has lived on both sides of the racial divide could gain.”—Cleveland Plain Dealer “A triumph of storytelling as well as a triumph of spirit.”—Alex Kotlowitz, award-winning author of There Are No Children Here As a child in 1950s segregated Virginia, Gregory Howard Williams grew up believing he was white. But when the family business failed and his parents’ marriage fell apart, Williams discovered that his dark-skinned father, who had been passing as Italian-American, was half black. The family split up, and Greg, his younger brother, and their father moved to Muncie, Indiana, where the young boys learned the truth about their heritage. Overnight, Greg Williams became black. In this extraordinary and powerful memoir, Williams recounts his remarkable journey along the color line and illuminates the contrasts between the black and white worlds: one of privilege, opportunity and comfort, the other of deprivation, repression, and struggle. He tells of the hostility and prejudice he encountered all too often, from both blacks and whites, and the surprising moments of encouragement and acceptance he found from each. Life on the Color Line is a uniquely important book. It is a wonderfully inspiring testament of purpose, perseverance, and human triumph. Winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize

A Life on the Line

Author: Darren Hodge
Publisher: Kerr Publishing
ISBN: 0958128367
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 139

Book Description
When the author was a kid, a big white sleek ambulance squatted like a lion in the driveway next door, always ready to go, and sometimes it did, roaring down the street. Today he is a MICA Flight Paramedic with decades of varied experience in 'a life of extremes' in an Australian ambulance service. He does shifts at base on-call, and teaches another generation of paramedics now. Loves his job. A list of well-known events that includes Victoria's Black Saturday Fires and the 2005 Bali Bombing - he was trying to get married when that call came in - mark two dark extremes. Technical matters - trauma treatment decisions, and the limits of aviation, for example - are explained. And this book includes the little things like the time the supermarket aisle was alive with the sound of music from an ex-patient's kid's lips: 'Thanks for looking after Daddy.' Darren couldn't have put it better himself, and it made his heart sing. This book tells what is like to be Darren Hodge on the end of a line, what it is like to be a paramedic. Open, honest reports, warts and all, this memoir is an unflinching account of how it feels, say, to pluck people from imminent death. And there are some laughs on the way...

Life on the Grocery Line (Second Edition)

Author: Adam Kaat
Publisher: Inspired Forever Books
ISBN: 9781948903776
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
On his first day as a cashier at Dream Grocers, Daniel imagines that the worst he'll have to deal with on the job are the occasional grumpy customers and long days on his feet. But in just one week's time, reality changes entirely as the COVID-19 pandemic creates a frenzied panic throughout Daniel's home state of Colorado. Now, he's suddenly being called a hero just for showing up at his job, and he isn't sure how to feel about that. As the uncertainty and paranoia around the virus spread rapidly, Daniel tries to stay afloat and not let the irate hordes of customers bring him down. He learns more than he ever expected to about humanity's response to fear, observing most prominently the way that some people look down on the very workers they deem "essential."

On Rope

Author: Bruce Smith
Publisher: Vertical Section National Speleological Society
ISBN:
Category : Crafts & Hobbies
Languages : en
Pages : 390

Book Description
North American vertical rope techniques for caving, search and rescue, firefighting, rope rescue, mountaineering, window cleaning, river runners, rock climbing, arborists, event riggers, military operations, challenge courses, nautical application, and rappellers.

Imaginary Line

Author: Jacques Poitras
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780864926500
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
For centuries, friends, lovers, schemers, and smugglers have reached across the line. Now, post 9/11, political paranoia has led to a sharp divide, disrupting the lives of residents caught in the middle of world events. An elderly Canadian couple's driveway touches the border, leading to a Kafkaesque overreaction by Homeland Security. The Tea Party calls for complete border shutdown. Once friendly neighbours have become increasingly isolated from each other.