I’ve had long days before. I mean, who hasn’t. Everyone has a horror story or two about work, some more drink worthy than others.

A friend and I were recently comparing notes over coffee, as one does when caffeine doubles as a therapist. The conversation inevitably twisted itself around the question: who had the longest day? The toughest day? Who survived the most chaos without losing their mind? 

Of course, coffee was present, much like a therapist taking notes and offering little nudges here and there, the kind that makes you pause, laugh, and almost admit your vulnerabilities.

And then it hit me—I knew exactly which day deserved that title. My longest day. The day I was both Dean of Students and athletic director, navigating a full slate of high school athletics during a pandemic. Masks, logs, temperature checks, sanitizer stations… and every single moving piece landing at once. It was a day that tested everything I had and then some.

They called it a season.

I called it a test of my sanity.

Late February to May, we crammed twelve months of missed games, postponed practices, and restless teenage energy into a window so small it could barely hold a pencil, let alone an entire athletics program. 

Volleyball? Canceled. Everything else? Go. 

Masks on. Temperature checks at the gate. Attendance logs thicker than my old yearbook. Sanitizer stations sprouting like weeds. And water bottles—oh, the water bottles—now a highly regulated resource that could get you in more trouble than forgetting your cleats.

It was a tough time to be a high school athlete. Tough time to be a student, period. School had basically been canceled and thrown into the chaos of learning from home. Zoom calls, Google Classroom, muting and unmuting, asking for a pencil through a screen—just getting students to show up to class had been a miracle. And now, after a year of navigating that mess, they were finally on the field. 

It had taken a full year of schedules gone sideways, technology meltdowns, and endless Zoom calls just to get them standing on the grass, masks on, cleats laced, ready to play.

And the stress? 

Oh, the stress. The fear. The unspoken tension of wondering if someone would get sick. Someone coughs, someone sneezes—you know the feeling. No need to explain. Every athlete, every coach, every parent could feel it in the air, heavier than any scoreboard.

It looked like a game day from the stands: athletes running, whistles blowing, scoreboard ticking.

What nobody saw was me juggling it all like some over-caffeinated circus ringmaster: keeping teams on track, equipment in order, spectators six feet apart, trainers in the right place, the AED ready, and my phone glued to my ear for good measure.

By the end of the day, I wasn’t sure if I’d survived a season—or a triathlon in PPE.

And then there was that day. The one that still sits in my chest a little heavier than the rest. Everything landed at once.

The schedule alone looked like a dare:

Girls Soccer – 3:00
Tennis – 3:30
Swim – 4:00
Girls Basketball – 4:00
Boys Soccer – 5:30
Softball – 6:00 (two blocks west, just far enough to be inconvenient)
Baseball – 6:30
Boys Basketball – 7:00

Football waiting in the wings the next day. Track still echoing from the day before.

It wasn’t a schedule. It was a stress test. 

The day had technically started at 8:00 a.m., though no one would call it “technically” in the relaxing sense. Zoom check-ins with teachers. Monitoring classes. Troubleshooting online learning. Making sure students weren’t completely lost in the chaos of virtual classrooms. Attempting, in my own small way, to keep the world from tipping over while also trying to remember which mask went where. This all happened from the comfort, quiet, and isolation of my office at the pool facility—my little bubble of control before the world started spilling over.

By 2:15, I was already moving out on campus.

“Bus is here.”

“Which one?” I asked, not breaking stride.

“Soccer.”

“Boys or girls?”

Pause.

“…Yes.”

Perfect.

From that point on, the day didn’t unfold—it accelerated.

Every team arrival meant the same ritual: greeting, temperature checks, symptom questions, directing them where to go without letting them wander anywhere they weren’t supposed to be.

“Coach, I need your roster.”

“I emailed it.”

“I need the paper copy.”

A look. A sigh. A reach into the bag.

We all had our roles. Mine just happened to be all of them. Spectators trickled in next. Two per athlete. No exceptions.

“Sorry, we drove together—can we just—”

“I get it. I really do. But it’s still two.”

Spacing them six feet apart turned the stands into a game of human Tetris.

“No, not there—yes, that’s six feet. No, that’s… that’s three. We’re not rounding up today.”

No concessions. No wandering. Just sit, watch, and exist within your assigned square of reality.

Meanwhile, somewhere across campus:

“Hey, we’re out of sanitizer at tennis.”

“On it.”

“Trainer’s needed at swim.”

“On it.”

“Do we have the AED at the field?”

Pause.

“…I’m on it.”

And then—hydration.

Of all things.

“Can we share a cooler?”

“No.”

“What if we don’t touch it?”

“No.”

“What if—”

“No.”

Water bottles became personal property on par with social security numbers. Label everything. Touch nothing. Distribute like you’re handling evidence. At one point I caught myself explaining proper water distribution protocols to a group of teenagers holding Gatorade like it was contraband. That’s when it fully hit home… this was not a normal day.

Somewhere in the middle of it all, my phone buzzed again.

Zoom meeting.

Of course.

So there I was—walking between facilities, mask on, radio clipped, phone in hand.

“Yes, we’re in compliance,” I said, stepping over a sideline cone.

“No, we’ve limited spectators,” I added, waving a family back into their six-foot zone.

“I’ll follow up with documentation,” I finished, as someone behind me asked, “Hey, do we have extra wristbands?”

There were no five minutes. Just moments stitched together by urgency.

Softball needed a check-in—two blocks west, which might as well have been two miles. Baseball was starting to warm up. Basketball teams were arriving. Soccer was mid-match. Swim was in full rhythm. Tennis was… somewhere, doing tennis things, hopefully with sanitizer.

And through it all, it moved. Not smoothly. Not perfectly. But forward.

Like a production no one rehearsed for, but everyone was expected to perform in.

From the outside, it probably looked like a normal—if slightly quieter—game day. A few masked spectators. Athletes competing. Coaches coaching. Whistles blowing. Scoreboards ticking.

The show went on.

But behind the scenes?

It was choreography. Every decision timed. Every adjustment calculated. Every problem solved before it could become visible. A thousand moving pieces held together by focus, instinct, and a refusal to let anything fall apart.

And most people only saw their part. The player saw the court. The coaches saw the game. The parents saw the stands.

I saw everything.

Though truth be told, I usually hovered off in the distance, perched in the furthest corner of the bleachers, a self-appointed sentinel keeping as far away from the cooties as humanly possible. 

From that vantage point, I could watch the flow of people, the shuffle of equipment, the dance of coaches and trainers, while still maintaining a semblance of personal bubble. Every gesture, every crossing of a lane, every sanitizer station refill was visible, like a slow-motion chess match played in masks and sneakers. The smell of sunscreen mixed with the faint tang of disinfectant, the rhythmic squeak of sneakers on gym floors echoing across empty hallways—it all painted a picture of controlled chaos.

From up there, I caught little moments too: a freshman fumbling a sanitizer bottle like it was a grenade, a coach waving frantically at someone who wandered too close, a parent tipping their mask and silently wincing at a sneeze.

I saw the overlaps. The gaps. The near-misses. The silent saves.

The radio chatter. The half-finished conversations. The constant recalculating.

It was me wearing all the hats. And somehow… none of them fell off.

It was the longest day. Not because of the hours—but because of the weight.

And yet… no wardrobe malfunctions.

Thank God for that.

There’s more waiting at https://xinkblotz.com. Telling stories, sharing thoughts, and drinking coffee. A blend of fiction, reflection, and whatever’s brewing – one post at a time.