Op-Ed: Are You Tiger Woods?

Are you Tiger Woods? Have you broken people's image of you? Have you done something that wasn't a crime but called into question who you are?

You’re the best in the world at your sport. You’ve been perfecting the skills and drive needed for the game almost since you came out the womb. You grow up in a world of fame within your sport because you are good, but no one outside of it knows who you are. You act as if the spotlight should only be on your work and not your private life. You just want to play. But along with your clubs comes a spotlight that’s starting to warm up. As soon as you reach adulthood, the spotlight gets brighter. Your entire life is illuminated, warts and all. The world knows you come from semi-humble beginnings in a broken home, a facet that society almost overlooks because it is now the norm. You haven’t committed any crimes, but people question your background because you don’t look like them. Yet you live in a world mostly reserved for them. Yet your skills are so unbelievable and you excel at your job that it appears your differences are overlooked. Suddenly you are paid insurmountable money to do your work. You become the most famous athlete in the world, clearly standing above and beyond your peers. People of all kinds are attracted to you. The opposite sex is suddenly attracted to you. Was it always that way, or is it from your fame? We’ll never know, because all we knew about you was how well you play. You just want to play. The fame is a part you deal with, not bask in. You meet a beautiful fair-skinned woman, fall in love, and get married. You have beautiful babies. You show them off only because you know that, no matter how hard you try, the spotlight is on you. You show everyone your family so that they don’t pry and dig any deeper. People have accepted your privacy now as part of the norm. Despite your incredible fame around the world, people tend to leave you alone. Until something happens. Tragedy happens. You are seriously hurt. The spotlight is now a supernova; no longer about your game but about your health. The emergency calls and situation become extremely interesting to the public because they care about you. The privacy invasion becomes one of concern because you are their idol. But when the details emerge, something looks fishy. And all of the sudden the supernova is not only bright, but black. Rumors about you begin to spread. You are private, so you don’t address them. The rumors gain validity. You address them, but vaguely. The rumors gain full-fledged steam and the proof is out: you aren’t the statue of perfection. You admit to some of it, but not all of it. They are still rumors, which are often based on half-truths. You are human, but you’ve committed gross human errors that shock and appall most of the public. We say "most" because, truthfully, others who have shared the same type of spotlight as you have done the same thing. But for them it was different. No one will really say why, but remember: you came into their world. It isn’t like basketball or football. Golf largely belongs to a different universe that you were invited to only because of that spotlight you’ve been reluctantly carrying along. If only they would just worry about how you play. So now you start to lose everything. You lose sponsors that your compatriots in other sports never lost for doing the same thing. You lose respect that you earned by your good game and good deeds; but is now lost from your bad behavior. You lose the privacy you miraculously had- how is it that no one knew your wrongdoings in the first place? You lose the beautiful, fair-skinned wife that was by your side when your father died. You’ve lost yourself. Are you Tiger Woods?