It’s been almost a week now and still so many people are trying to come to grips with what happened. And it’s not easy. Life will never be the same.

Brett Favre retired. Oh, seeing that in black and white is more painful than I thought. And things are just so bleak, I mean, the NFL without Brett Favre, one of the hundreds of quarterbacks who ever played, it’s incomprehensible and … please, just give me a minute. I have to collect myself here.

OK, thank you. I don’t mean to be so emotional, but I am replaying in my mind Brett’s three-hanky press conference in which he and a nation had to come to grips with a Brett-less NFL. Is it really possible? Is it? When the league starts up again in September, will we really be able to plunk down that $175 for a ticket (not including $15 facility fee and $11.50 handling charge) and wonder if we can really bring ourselves to watch a sport in which there is no Brett Favre? And is football really a sport anymore? Without Brett, it’s just a game. A simple meaningless game that will have us asking every Sunday, and Monday nights, and some Thursdays, whether it’s all worth it.

As I watched Brett struggle to find the words to express his depth of emotion (and truly, there are no words, except for maybe, “As you’ve known for days, I’m retiring”), I too was overcome with emotion. All I could think about was how hard this was on Brett, how unfair life truly was to take a man from what he loved. Oh, time, you are a cruel mistress.

Here he was, a man in his prime, just 38 or whatever, faced with years and years of leisure in front of him. While the rest of us struggle to make enough money to retire, keeping busy as fry cooks and Wal-Mart greeters well into our 70s, Brett has to find a way to fill the time in a way that will take into account the millions of dollars he’s made as a quarterback.

Imagine as Brett rises on an NFL Sunday morning, realizing that halfway across the world from his Tuscan villa, large men are beating themselves senseless without him. And has he slowly picks at his breakfast on the veranda, wondering if he should spend a few days in Greece or perhaps tour the Italian Alps for a while, you just know his thoughts will stray to Green Bay and he will think, “I’ll have to check the Net later to get some scores.” And I wonder how Brett will deal with that moment when football once again tugs at him, and I pray that maybe by that time there will be an ESPN Italiano allowing Brett to see those play the game that was stolen from him, not counting the times he has a bunch of friends over to the farm for a game of touch.

Brett, I just wanted you to know that even though you won’t ever play in the NFL again, save for when you are paid $50,000 to participate in an old-timers game, every American – no, every citizen on the globe – admires you for your bravery to retire comfortably at 38. I can’t think of another man or woman who would willingly make the same decision, unless they too were forced to subsist on personal appearances, speaking engagements and lucrative autograph sessions.

I will never forget you, Brett Favre. You are an inspiration to us all.