Everybody knew you were a football player. There was glory in wearing that sweater. He can still reach across the years, though, and touch that sweet time. He can still tell you about the Wildcats' double-wing formation and what someone said in a huddle. You don't forget because there is nothing to take its place.
High school is the last of the innocence.
There is college and family and work and all, more important things as life moves along, but we keep our high school days tucked away in a corner of our minds to be taken out from time to time, dusted off and lived again. After high school, being the best looking or the best dancer or the most popular doesn't matter much anymore. Life becomes more real and football heroes come back down from the pedestal to be with the rest of us. So we save high school, like a flower pressed between the pages of a diary, or a varsity sweater stored in the attic. We thought we were, anyway.