Seán Morantalks to Waterford's Paul Flynn ahead of Sunday's All-Ireland final against Kilkenny
"And did you exchange a walk-on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?"
There is an irony in the span of Paul Flynn's career that inverts the Pink Floyd lyric.
After the fireworks of under-age competition - for instance 3-6 to take Tipperary to a replay in the 1992 Munster minor final en route to that year's All-Ireland final, which was until this year the last time Waterford have featured in Croke Park in early September, and 1-5 over the same year's under-21 final and replay, the last elite All-Ireland won by the county - Flynn made his senior debut against Kerry in 1993.
The very thing that coach George Leahy had tried to frighten them with - reading about their sensational defeat in Monday's papers - actually happened. Kerry's first win in a championship match since the 1920s rather overshadowed the 18-year-old debutant's 3-2.
A few years later he recalled: "Back then, you went out hoping that your opponents would hurl below themselves and your team might rise above themselves. There was no real purpose or conviction about what we did."
From individually excelling in a black-letter day for the county, fast forward 15 years and Flynn faces into what is likely to be the last match of a long career but thanks to injuries and the wear and tear of it all, no longer as a first-choice for what could be the county's greatest day in nearly 50 years.
"It's all my adult life," he reflected at last week's Waterford media night. "I started hurling with Waterford when I was 18 and now I'm 33, so I've done nothing in the summer except play hurling with Waterford. It's not a habit but it's in you and for the first time this year looking in it is completely different.
"I don't think - and this is no disrespect to anyone who's done it - if I was in and out the whole time that I could do it. It would be a lot harder to give the commitment if you weren't playing half the time or any of the time so I was lucky that I was a regular for so long."
He confirms that if not exactly touch-and-go, the decision to return to inter-county hurling after ankle surgery and a longer than anticipated rehabilitation is not open-ended either.
"I never really gave it any great thought not to go back or to go back and before I knew it I was back with the craic with the lads and the trips. Training is good fun and that's what brings you back rather than that ultimate All-Ireland medal that people talk about. But would I have been comfortable retiring last February? I would have been very comfortable."
His wealth of experience encompasses pre-history and the evolution that has led inexorably - if maybe a little later than would be ideal - to a first All-Ireland final since 1963.
"I remember Jimmy Beresford beating hurleys off me," he says when asked about his earliest memory as a senior. "I was called to the panel in April '93 before the Munster championship and I hadn't even played a senior game with my club. My first senior hurling game was a challenge game against Kilkenny below in The Rower-Inistioge, marking Eddie O'Connor - so there you go," he adds in dead-pan recollection of his debut on the fearsome corner back.
"In those days Waterford used to break up the panel at the end of the league and go back training three weeks before the Munster championship. That may explain the lack of success in those years. There were plenty of good players in Waterford at that time to win a Munster title. Looking back on it now it was the training or lack of training or lack of commitment asked for. We weren't used to training that hard."
His scoring talents - 28 championship goals - in at times under-achieving teams made for a solitary existence. Criticised at times for not performing in big matches Flynn was nearly always under pressure to deliver.
Stephen Frampton in 2001 described his former county and club-mate's hurling personality in terms of its creativity while hinting at the vulnerability.
"He is at his best when he is carefree and will try literally anything, flicks and dummies and unorthodox things that many people wouldn't dream of. But it is just natural expression to him and I think that is what sets him apart. It is his confidence that feeds that."
Yet in what was the season of probably the team's best chance to win the All-Ireland, 2004, he could have hardly done more in the most stressful of circumstances.
Stepping up to the mark after the sending off and subsequent suspension of John Mullane, he rifled in the goal - he's also the most ferocious dispatcher of close-in frees since Nicky Rackard - that turned the Munster final and gave his greatest display in the ensuing All-Ireland semi-final when mounting an at times one-man resistance to Kilkenny.
As one of the most senior players on the panel he must have been consulted in last June's coup against former manager Justin McCarthy but his relaxed style answering media questions doesn't mean he wavers off-message when that subject is raised.
"It was something that happened and we've all moved on since then. There were three of four qualifiers that we struggled through and enjoyed a bit of luck against Tipperary with the square ball and Clinton's save and the full forward (Micheál Webster) driving the ball wide. Maybe that was the turning point of the year rather than other events."
After five unsuccessful semi-finals, last month's win over Tipperary was a relief as well as a breakthrough but there was curiously no elation in Flynn's reaction to the final whistle.
"It was weird. I don't get excited about a hell of a lot, to be honest, but I actually said there's more to do. My immediate feeling was that there was more to do, that the hardest task was ahead. I don't think playing in five All-Irelands and losing five would be much good either. Finals are for winning."
Flynn Facts
Age: 33
Club: Ballygunner
Height: 5ft 10in
Weight: 14st
Honours: Munster SHC 2002, 2004 and 2007; All-Ireland under-21 1992; Munster club 2002; Munster MHC 1992; Railway Cup 1995, 1996 and 2000; All Star 2004
