MORGANTOWN - Major Harris is approaching his induction into the College Football Hall of Fame roughly the same way he's approached most of his adult life.

In other words, he's not sure what's going to happen or how things work, but he'll manage it all on the fly.

"I really don't know how everything works, but I'm definitely looking forward to it,'' Harris said. "I don't know if it's like the NFL Hall of Fame where we have to make speeches or what. I don't know what the whole thing entails.''

When he shows up in South Bend, Ind., next weekend for the Friday and Saturday ceremonies, though, don't think for a moment that Harris will be have to search for the words if he's asked to speak.

"Yeah, I'll probably have something to say,'' Harris said. "You know me.''

True, it has been 21 years - fully half of the 42-year-old Harris' life - since he left West Virginia in 1989, and seldom during that time has he been at a loss for words. What the former All-America and Heisman Trophy-contending quarterback has struggled with is what to do with that life.

These days he seems still to be making a career out of being Major Harris, which is not necessarily a bad thing but it isn't exactly a traditional line of work, either. He spends time working with young people at a youth center near his home in Pittsburgh, but for the most part one of the most iconic sports figures in WVU history seems at a loss for what to do with the rest of his life.

Well, perhaps not a loss, but certainly at a crossroads.

"To be honest, I've been jumping around doing different things, football camps and appearances and stuff like that dealing with the whole Hall of Fame thing,'' Harris said. "And I've played in a couple celebrity golf tournaments. I just played in [former WVU offensive lineman Brian] Jozwiak's. But to be honest, I've just been kind of taking it easy right now with the Hall of Fame thing. And then after that's when I'll probably look into doing something else, something career-wise.

"I got a call from a guy where they're trying to get this arena football team out in Reno [Nev.]. He called me about being a coach out there. So after this Hall of Fame thing is over I'll probably go into something like that - you know, coaching opportunities.''

Opportunities are something Harris has never really lacked. Taking advantage of them - or choosing the right ones - has been the issue.

Since leaving West Virginia, Harris has never really had what most people would call a career. He spent more than a decade trying to carve a niche in football, be it in the CFL, the Arena Football League or a vast assortment of semi-pro minor leagues. When he finally gave that up, he began working with young people, has tried his hand at coaching and now seems up in the air about where to turn next. He's still a legend, both at WVU and in his neighborhood in the Hill district in Pittsburgh, but being a legend isn't exactly a mainstream occupation, and he wouldn't mind finding one of those.

But again, that's been the reality of Harris' life since he left school.

"It's funny because every time I've had an opportunity to do one thing, then another opportunity would pop up,'' Harris said. "It's just like now with trying to coach. You get caught up in different things and I never really settled down to do one thing.''

That was how his football career went. Hoping for an NFL career when he left WVU after his junior season, Harris figured on parlaying his success in college (two top-five Heisman finishes) into success in the pros. But he was picked in the 12th and final round of the 1990 NFL draft by the Oakland Raiders and never saw an NFL training camp. The Raiders asked him to spend a year in Canada, which he did, backing up Doug Flutie with the BC Lions.

He made close to $100,000 that year, but it would be his last gaudy check. Harris then spent the next decade-plus bouncing around in Arena ball and then in semi-pro leagues. He seemed to know very quickly that it wasn't going to lead to any kind of stardom, but he couldn't let go of the dream.

Every time he would decide to call it quits, another opportunity would come up - sometimes more than one at a time.

"When I look back on it, the way my career went I think it hurt me,'' Harris said. "I mean, I think back to when I was an All-American and I was up for the Heisman. If I hadn't had all that success, maybe after a couple of years I would have realized I wasn't going to go to the NFL and that my football career was over. At that point maybe you move on with your life.

"But the way it was, the success I had, every time I thought about doing something else, another chance to play football would pop up. I could never get away from it. And then pretty soon it's 20 years later.''

As it would happen, football is still pulling on Harris.

"You think you're getting away from it and then this whole Hall of Fame thing pops up,'' Harris said. "It's like you're trying to escape from something and it keeps popping back up. I'm not saying it's bad, but it kind of keeps you in that same circle that you've always been in.''

Harris had one golden opportunity to escape from that circle, but he only took it part of the way. In 1995 he returned to West Virginia and finished his degree in physical education. But instead of walking off that graduation platform and into the workforce, he was pulled back into playing football.

"I probably should have went ahead and gone to grad school or gotten my teaching certificate or something. Maybe I could have been a [graduate assistant coach] back then or something,'' Harris said. "And who knows, I probably would be coaching somewhere. But once I got my degree I got a call from an Arena football team about coming to play again. Then I was back out there chasing football again.

"Being that I was young enough back then, I kept playing. And that's what, in a sense, kind of kept me from establishing myself in one field or another. I went right back to playing football again. I never really had a chance to go back and get my teaching certificate. And I was always jumping around so much with football opportunities that I never really got settled in any particular area.''

The football thing is long over now, of course. In recent years Harris has tried his hand at coaching high school football as an assistant and has continued to work with youngsters. He was ready to settle down and put his playing career firmly in the rear-view mirror when he got what he considered the shocking call from the Hall of Fame. That didn't turn him back into a player, of course, but it revived the memories of his playing career.

"The funniest thing about it was a couple of days before they called me about the Hall of Fame, they had just re-opened this community center where I'm from in Pittsburgh. And at the center they had this thing where they put different players' jerseys up in the rafters,'' Harris said. "The mayor of Pittsburgh came when they re-opened it and I was one of the guys whose jersey was retired. So when I got the call about the Hall of Fame, I thought they were talking about this community thing. I didn't even realize what they were talking about.''

The call was one Harris never really considered he would get because most players in the college hall are guys who had at least a decent NFL career.

"And I never set foot in the NFL,'' Harris said. "It shocked me.''

So for at least another week, Harris will live the life of a legend. Afterward he will begin to look around and figure out what he wants to do with the rest of his life.

But as for the part that's in the past, while he might regret some of the career choices he has made or didn't make, he has few regrets.

Major Harris is happy being what he is, which is Major Harris.

"Yeah, I'm happy,'' Harris said. "When I look back on my career or my life, I'm not bitter or mad or anything. And now the Hall of Fame thing, I think it all puts a positive light on the way my career went. I feel good about it. Anytime you're inducted into any kind of hall of fame, that says a lot.''

Reach Dave Hickman at 304-348-1734 or dphickm...@aol.com.