THE sun is flickering gamely over the West of Scotland cricket ground, the future is sunny Sydney for the Aussie defiantly patrolling the outfield in long shorts so the natural Caledonian tendency is to talk of dark days.

Dan Parks could have been forgiven for believing that part of his Scotland career was not only played in dark blue but in stocks. He seemed not have a number on his back, but a target.

Approaching 37, he returns to Sydney this week after 12 years playing professional rugby for Scotland, Glasgow Warriors, Cardiff Blues and Connacht.

He is grateful for the experience and stronger because of it. He has known "the dark days" but reflects most passionately on the good times. This is a good story on a fine night when Parks has talked with children about sport before he heads off to a new horizon.

His experience is relevant to other athletes, even to those non-sporting combatants on the sidelines. There may be bad times but they can be followed by the sublime.

"I do not think I have ever felt better than after the Irish game in 2010," he says of the Scottish victory at Croke Park where he scored 18 points in a 23-20 victory.

"The Irish fans had left or were leaving the stadium and we did a lap and all we could see was pockets of blue. The hairs are going up on the back of my neck just thinking about it. It was just us and the support. I have a picture of myself looking up into the stands and it says a lot about how I was feeling at that very moment. It was the year after my troubles and it was like something had been taken off my shoulders. I just felt: 'This is why I play rugby'."

The "troubles' involved a drink drive offence, a loss of form and confidence and an international exile that lasted 18 months. Parks is walking towards a future in coaching and could be forgiven for wanting to concentrate on the match-winning performances, the record points tallies, the friends made, the memories shared, the experience gained.

He does of all of that but he remains a prime example of how sport can exert pressures that can form or break a personality. Parks is a living example of how those difficulties can be surmounted.

"My thought at the time was simple: 'It can go one or two ways here'," he says.

"I knew that the only person who could fix anything or fight back to form was myself. There have been some tough times in my career. You need strength of character and I had that after that bad time in 2009. I had let family, friends and myself down so I had to correct it. I made a mistake. I had to deal with it."

He did. He had his best pre-season, played well at the start of the season and played a leading role in a fine 6 Nations campaign for the Scots. He scored the winning kick against Ireland from a difficult angle on the touchline but it was the move that preceded the award of the penalty that showed Parks in his best light. He spotted space, saw the Irish defender could be isolated and perfectly positioned his kick.

"I believed I was the strongest option at 10 for Scotland at the time and I proved that," he says.

Redemption was as immediate as condemnation had been. "It is crazy, but that is sport. People at certain times will give you a hard time. They will. But that is what makes more satisfying when you come out the other side. Mental toughness? You either have it or you don't."

His experiences should make him a formidable coach. He recognises the criticism meted out to such as Peter Horne who missed touch against Italy and was blamed for the subsequent defeat.

But he is optimistic about Horne, Scotland and the Warriors.

"He was having a great match until the missed touch. The poor guy slipped, he got cramp ..." he says of the 25-year-old Warriors fly-half.

But he immediately makes the coaching point. "The game should have been over at half-time. In the second half I do not know what the instructions on the pitch were but why were we playing so much rugby? It was wet, Italy were never going to score from deep. It is not about winning by six or eight tries. Just win it."

But he admires how Horne reacted to his disappointment.

"The next month for Glasgow he was outstanding. He is key to the team," he says. Horne, who has been named in the Guinness Pro 12 team of the year, plays under Gregor Townsend who was also criticised both as a player and a backs coach at Scotland.

Parks believes Townsend has prevailed because he is his own man and now can impose his methods without direction from above.

"I love what he is doing with the young guys because there is a lot of them coming through," he says.

Of the Warriors, he is extremely positive. He talks of the "hard yakka" when he arrived in Glasgow in 2003 of playing against teams that were "bigger, meaner". The Warriors have now flexed their muscles in the Guinness Pro 12 and Parks says: "I believe it will be a travesty if they do not win the competition. They have been the best team throughout the season. The players genuinely believe they can win. You can see it their eyes."

He adds: "This is the year."

Parks will be in Sydney laying the foundations for his coaching career when the season comes to its climax. But how does the man approaching 37 resemble the hopeful who arrived in Glasgow 12 years ago?

"I am older wiser and have more grey hairs," he says. "But I do not know that I have ever changed. I have retained my passion for life. I really enjoy my life, sometimes too much. But I have learned life lessons."

He is now ready and equipped to pass them on.