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Does Anyone Stay Together Anymore? (or How Coach Culver Made Me Run Until I Puked and Somehow Saved My Future Marriage)

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August 1978.
The sun was trying to kill us. I’m convinced of it. The Rockhurst High practice field in Kansas City felt less like grass and more like a skillet someone had forgotten to turn off. We were knee-deep in two-a-days, that magical time when teenage boys willingly volunteer to be dehydrated, yelled at, humbled, and “character built” whether they asked for it or not.

I was 16, exhausted, and very sure I would not survive to see Labor Day. That's when Coach Jerry Culver, dad of one of my classmates and my varsity coach, gathered our half-dead squad and delivered a speech that welded itself to the inside of my skull.

He looked at us and said, “Don’t you dare give up. Once you give up on yourself the first time, it gets easier and easier to give up on everything else, your family, your schoolwork, your career, your wife, your kids.”

At 16, I had no wife. No kids. No career. I didn't even have a girlfriend. All I had was heat stroke and the faint hope of surviving another wind sprint. But his words didn’t just land; they took root. And so I ran. I ran until my legs buckled, my lungs whined, and yes… I ran until I puked.

But somewhere in that mess, Coach Culver planted a stubborn streak in me. A refusal to quit when something mattered. And lately, as I look at the world, I’ve been wondering whether everyone else has received a Coach Culver speech… because the evidence suggests otherwise.

Does Anyone Stay Together Anymore? Marriage used to be the ultimate “we’re in this for the long haul.” Today, the U.S. marriage rate hovers around 50%, and half of those marriages wobble. Relationships seem to have a shorter shelf life than the milk in my fridge.

And it’s not just marriages. It feels like everywhere you look, loyalty has the lifespan of a TikTok trend.

  • Comedy teams break up.
  • Bands break up.
  • Hollywood divorces are seasonal.
  • Athletes switch teams like they’re switching cell phone providers.

And I’ve wondered: Is commitment dying? Or did people just never learn what it means to stay?

But Then I Look at My Own Life… and Realize Something Important. If someone read my résumé without context, they might think I moved around a bit. But here’s the truth, and it fits perfectly with Coach Culver’s philosophy: There’s a difference between quitting… and evolving.

I began my college education at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio. I didn’t leave because I quit. I left because I went on an adventure with my fraternity brother, and now lifelong friend, to Southwest Missouri State. That wasn’t running away. That was running toward someone who mattered to me. There we met our future spouses.

In my early teaching career, I moved every few years, not because I lacked commitment,
but because I was positioning myself, growing, preparing for the next opportunity. Then I found St. Michael the Archangel in Shrewsbury, and stayed 12 years. Because I fell in love with the place. The families. The kids. The mission.

When I became a principal, I discovered something true of many good principals:
Every 5–6 years, there's an itch. Not an itch to quit, but an itch to stay sharp. An itch to avoid stagnation. An itch to move before I stop being the leader my school deserves.

That’s not giving up. That’s stewardship. That’s leadership with integrity.  And yet, when it comes to the things that matter most…

  • my marriage
  • my children
  • my grandchildren

…that’s where Coach Culver’s voice rings the loudest.

There, I don’t run. There, I don’t waver. There, I don’t quit. Because some commitments aren’t “jobs” or “phases”, they are vows.

Coach Culver didn’t tell us:

“Stay in the same job forever.”
“Never move towns.”
“Never chase opportunity.”

He taught us: Don’t quit on yourself.  Don’t quit on people. And don’t quit when it’s hard. Your life isn’t a pattern of quitting; it’s a pattern of answering the next calling, then staying rooted where the soul's work is.

That’s the difference between:

  • escaping and expanding
  • abandoning and ascending
  • quitting and discerning

And if more people understood that difference? More marriages could last. More bands could stay together. More teams would likely persevere. Maybe loyalty wouldn’t be considered an antique virtue.

Be Someone’s Coach Culver. We all need that voice, the one that says: “You’re tired, but you’re not done. Don’t quit. You’ve got more in you.”

And if we ran just one more metaphorical wind sprint, even if we puked a little, maybe we’d learn that staying power is still possible. For jobs. For friendships. For teams. For marriages.
For families. For each other.

Not because it’s easy, but because it’s right. And because someone once told us, under a scorching August sky: “Don’t you dare give up.”

 


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