Hello you wild and crazy Floridians!
> I'm sitting here in a classroom in Atlanta, proctoring a Spanish/French exam and disguised as a high school teacher. There are 18 kids in here, none of them which appear to be cheating to the naked eye. No riots, no expulsions, no deaths have happened on my watch as of yet. Jesus wept.
> A lot has happened to me since I've left your shiny state - beside the fact that I've put on 20 pounds and now go for waddles instead of runs. Though I do miss the couch at Running Sports, I have found one in our Upper School Chaplain's office at school. She's 35 and hot but who's counting? Me, I'm just trying to get by in this crazy Atlanta world.
> I love my job and my life, though I'm not getting any. Perhaps that was too much information for my holiday "Christmas card" but facts are facts and I am supposed to be a reporter. Have a very small and wee intention to run the Chicago Marathon in '09 - Gary Walk save me a room. Plan on breaking the six-hour mark and qualify to stay the hell out of Boston for as long as I shall live. Once you've kissed your share of Wellesley girls, the feeling to go back kinda fades.
> My ex-wife is in Boston, speaking of, so perhaps I'm not allowed back anyway. She's doing fine and would say hello if she knew I were writing this. So hello, and let's move on.
> My cross country team had a couple qualify for state - one girl finished in the top ten. My boys tennis team might win the state title in spite of me, and I'm spending the winter months sitting at the scorer's table during basketball games and keeping up with all the points, fouls and time outs. They even make me wear an official shirt with the black and white stripes on it. Me, official, who figured?
> My Falcons have screwed up and won a few games, my Georgia Bulldogs can't tackle for shit and my Braves will probably make it back to postseason sometimes before or after hell freezes. My tennis game is pretty good - my mixed doubles partner is a hot 25-year-old Spaniard who I've often tried to seduce and failed miserably. She has a great forehand, though.
> But enough about me.
> George R., keep sending me those Running Sports Newsletters but start putting more pictures of Adrianna in there. Gary, gain some weight. George B., you and I sound like we're on the same running program these days, so perhaps we'll go for a 1/4 mile jog some day. Janine, call me when you get to Monroe - we'll run and I'll try not to stare. Thom, write your cook book. There's money to be made. Kevin Spina - attend a PB Roadrunner meeting and fall asleep in my honor - just the way I used to do it. And order two beers and charge them to Allan Metsky. And Kara Weber - Merry Christmas and I hoped you've moved on successfully. You deserve the best and I really mean that. Though I still wish your Gators would quit kicking the absolute shit out of my Bulldogs every Halloween.
> I must go now. The kids are finishing up and I'm supposed to say something profound. All I can think of is, "Man, I have to pee!" They probably pay to hear a little more than that, something more Shakespearean. Oh well, who died and left me boss.
> I'm just glad to be here.
> And one day, yes one day, I'll return to your hot lands and go for a run. You guys can run 10 and I'll run from Running Sports to US 1 and back and wait for your asses at Dunkin Donuts. First bagel is on Gary Walk, but I'll buy the vanilla coffee with cream and teeth-rotting amounts of sugar. My stomach's rolling just thinking about it.
> Merry Christmas though, seriously, and Happy New Year.
> And as always, somebody kiss Adrianna for me.
> > Dunn> James Dunn>
Sunday, December 28, 2008
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
A dream ends in Norcross
Bears fall 21-7 to Wesleyan
First for the logistics: Getting from Holy Innocents’ to Wesleyan at 4:45 on a Friday afternoon simply can’t be done. It’s a you-can’t-get-there-from-here waiting to happen. Head Coach Ryan Livezey and assistants Ron Green and Bill Railey check their I-phones, looking for the latest traffic reports.
“Traffic’s backed up to Riverside,” Railey says. Green just nods. Livezey leans forward to the bus driver – the same driver and same bus as last week for good luck – and gives the orders. “Let’s just go 285; we’ll get off at Peachtree-Industrial and try our luck that way.”
So off the Golden Bears go, 13-0 winners over Bowdon the week before, a team that has now advanced to the Sweet 16 two years in a row. It’s a quiet bus – a trip with the Golden Bears isn’t a trip to rah-rah land. There’s no yelling, no cheers, no singing – in fact some are actually asleep as the bus does its stop-and-go thing through tens of thousands of Atlantans eager to get into their weekend.
It’s cold outside – “so cold it hurts” one would say – so hand and foot warmers, hats and long johns are the order of the night. The equipment bus has apparently taken the short route – they went Roswell Road, hung a right at North Springs and then hit Spalding Drive all the way to the Promised Land.
The bus arrives at around 5:15 p.m.; it parks right in front of a sign which reads “Bears Hibernate – 11-21-2008. We hope not. Last year the Final 16 was our exit; this year’s team comes hoping for better things.
In the locker room:
Again, this isn’t your made-for-TV locker room. Knute Rockne doesn’t deliver the roundhouse speech in front of a bunch of screaming kids. No, it’s methodical times 12 as each coach grabs the chalk, writes on the board and delivers tonight’s mantra.
“They aren’t going to do anything unexpected,” Livezey says. “It’s going to be a matter of execution. It’s going to be a matter of who wants to continue playing football.” Avid faces lean forward, equipment half on, half off, some waiting to be taped, all hyped up on the inside in spite of the outward appearances.
Trainer Lindsey Law tapes quietly in the corner. Assistant Coach Marshall Gaines passes out defensive equipment. Forrest Stillwell and Dan Forrester head outside to get the lay of the land.
There are “Go Wolves” signs everywhere. We know already we are facing a team eager for revenge. We beat them last year 3-0 in regular season, eliminating them from the playoffs. In Week 3 of this season, it was a 7-6 win right here in Wolf-Hood that stopped our losing streak and put us on the road to postseason.
Can we do it again?
There’s promise and hope in the air as the teams go through “Flex” and the fans, instead of heading for the seats, stay in their cars for warmth.
“Hand warmers anyone?” cheerleading coach Alyson Miller says from the track next to our bench. There are several takers.
With a hand too cold to keep stats and a brain too buzzed on Friday Night Mayhem, this is what I recall:
We again dodged bullet after bullet in the first half, what baseball great Yogi Berra would refer to as “Déjà vu all over again.” Wesleyan drives the opening kickoff down our throats and has a first-and-goal.
But – like shades of last Friday – our defense stiffens and – on 4th-and-2, a bone-jarring tackle forces a fumble in the end zone that the Bears recover.
But… we go three-and-out and the snap for the punt is low. John McKay scoops it up hurriedly and kicks it off but it’s blocked. Once again, the Wolves have it in our red zone.
And again our defense stiffens. A 29-year-field goal is wide left and the Bears have new life.
It would happen again. The Wolves take a second quarter punt and drive it outside our 25-yard line. But a pass is intercepted inside the 10 and the Bears appear to be living right.
The Wolves do break the ice early in the second quarter, however, when the lefty quarterback finds his wide receiver for a 30-yard strike and a score. The PAT is good and the bad guys are up 7-0.
“It’s like a heavyweight fight,” Forrester had warned the team all week. “They’ll throw a punch; then we’ve got to take it and throw one back.”
We do.
Wills Aitkens takes the ensuing kickoff all the way down to the Wesleyan 16. Then, on 4th-and-goal from the 4, Peter Allen takes a Will Allen handoff and cracks it in off-tackle for the score. Collin Rhea converts the point after and it’s 7-7.
The first half ends that way.
“We’ve been given a gift,” Railey says in the locker room. Stillwell agrees. “For us to play this poorly and to still be tied….I know we’re going to play better in the second half. Do we want this season to end tonight?”
A chorus of “No’s” break out through the otherwise silent locker room.
Each coach delivers their spiel. “You said you were going to do whatever it took tonight for us to win,” Mike Thornton yells. “We haven’t done that. Let’s go!”
The words are received; even this reporter wants to don a pair of pads and go play the second half – the half which would decide either a trip to Savannah or the planning of our post-season banquet.
Unfortunately…
Call it fate, call it God’s will, call it the Divine Plan. Regardless, the Football Gods smiled down on the Wolves in the second half. And give them credit – they played a good football game.
On the other hand, however, you ain’t human if you don’t feel for our kids – especially those seniors who have given six years of their time (including JV) to make this trip happen. To see Mo Green wrap up for another tackle. Connor Randall foiling a would-be passer. Collin Rhea stepping up on both sides of the ball and special teams. Rawson Allen recovering from a bone-splitting tackle the week before only to suit up and hit the field again; the spirit of Tucker Lansing, the guts of John Mitchell, the hands of Jack Farrell. There are plenty more.
Regardless, Wesleyan turns a HIES fumble into a score in the third quarter; they would add another TD in the fourth as time and the season runs out on our beloved Bears.
Later…
“I’m disappointed we lost but I’m not disappointed in any one of you guys,” Livezey says. The stadium lights – save one post – are all out. Even Wesleyan has gone in for warmth and next week’s plans.
Our Bears are huddled – no hibernation in sight thank you very much – at around the 15-yard-line.
Livezey himself is at a loss for words. After all, what do you say to a team of kids who have given you their guts, their livers and their spleens for all those years? How do you adequately wish these seniors well and praise them for their efforts? How do you recognize such a young football program already recognized as a power, even though these sentiments aren’t felt at the moment?
Maybe you just do exactly what these young Bears did: They just held on to each other and there were tears. They just slap backs, exchange hugs of respect and look each other in the eye. They huddle and stick close together out of respect and loyalty, out of love for the game, out of love for the program and their school.
True, the Football Gods – and a good Wesleyan football team – has ended this season. But nothing diminishes these positives felt here, these sentiments expressed here.
This is a good group to walk off this field with. This is a good group to share this pain with. This is a good coaching staff to mix in with. “You’re loyal to each other and you love each other – that’s what got us here in the first place,” Stillwell says.
He’s right.
And in spite of the pain – maybe even because of the pain – this feeling makes for a glimmer of hope deep down, a sense of joy, a sense of being in the right place, in the right time and with the right group of kids.
As the last post of lights go out – as the locker room doors open and close for us the last time, as the bus cranks up and takes us through the cold, across town and back home – there’s almost a smile in back of the tears.
After all, you can go through hell if you go through it with the right people.
We love you Bears!
Dunn Neugebauer
Nov. 22, 2008
First for the logistics: Getting from Holy Innocents’ to Wesleyan at 4:45 on a Friday afternoon simply can’t be done. It’s a you-can’t-get-there-from-here waiting to happen. Head Coach Ryan Livezey and assistants Ron Green and Bill Railey check their I-phones, looking for the latest traffic reports.
“Traffic’s backed up to Riverside,” Railey says. Green just nods. Livezey leans forward to the bus driver – the same driver and same bus as last week for good luck – and gives the orders. “Let’s just go 285; we’ll get off at Peachtree-Industrial and try our luck that way.”
So off the Golden Bears go, 13-0 winners over Bowdon the week before, a team that has now advanced to the Sweet 16 two years in a row. It’s a quiet bus – a trip with the Golden Bears isn’t a trip to rah-rah land. There’s no yelling, no cheers, no singing – in fact some are actually asleep as the bus does its stop-and-go thing through tens of thousands of Atlantans eager to get into their weekend.
It’s cold outside – “so cold it hurts” one would say – so hand and foot warmers, hats and long johns are the order of the night. The equipment bus has apparently taken the short route – they went Roswell Road, hung a right at North Springs and then hit Spalding Drive all the way to the Promised Land.
The bus arrives at around 5:15 p.m.; it parks right in front of a sign which reads “Bears Hibernate – 11-21-2008. We hope not. Last year the Final 16 was our exit; this year’s team comes hoping for better things.
In the locker room:
Again, this isn’t your made-for-TV locker room. Knute Rockne doesn’t deliver the roundhouse speech in front of a bunch of screaming kids. No, it’s methodical times 12 as each coach grabs the chalk, writes on the board and delivers tonight’s mantra.
“They aren’t going to do anything unexpected,” Livezey says. “It’s going to be a matter of execution. It’s going to be a matter of who wants to continue playing football.” Avid faces lean forward, equipment half on, half off, some waiting to be taped, all hyped up on the inside in spite of the outward appearances.
Trainer Lindsey Law tapes quietly in the corner. Assistant Coach Marshall Gaines passes out defensive equipment. Forrest Stillwell and Dan Forrester head outside to get the lay of the land.
There are “Go Wolves” signs everywhere. We know already we are facing a team eager for revenge. We beat them last year 3-0 in regular season, eliminating them from the playoffs. In Week 3 of this season, it was a 7-6 win right here in Wolf-Hood that stopped our losing streak and put us on the road to postseason.
Can we do it again?
There’s promise and hope in the air as the teams go through “Flex” and the fans, instead of heading for the seats, stay in their cars for warmth.
“Hand warmers anyone?” cheerleading coach Alyson Miller says from the track next to our bench. There are several takers.
With a hand too cold to keep stats and a brain too buzzed on Friday Night Mayhem, this is what I recall:
We again dodged bullet after bullet in the first half, what baseball great Yogi Berra would refer to as “Déjà vu all over again.” Wesleyan drives the opening kickoff down our throats and has a first-and-goal.
But – like shades of last Friday – our defense stiffens and – on 4th-and-2, a bone-jarring tackle forces a fumble in the end zone that the Bears recover.
But… we go three-and-out and the snap for the punt is low. John McKay scoops it up hurriedly and kicks it off but it’s blocked. Once again, the Wolves have it in our red zone.
And again our defense stiffens. A 29-year-field goal is wide left and the Bears have new life.
It would happen again. The Wolves take a second quarter punt and drive it outside our 25-yard line. But a pass is intercepted inside the 10 and the Bears appear to be living right.
The Wolves do break the ice early in the second quarter, however, when the lefty quarterback finds his wide receiver for a 30-yard strike and a score. The PAT is good and the bad guys are up 7-0.
“It’s like a heavyweight fight,” Forrester had warned the team all week. “They’ll throw a punch; then we’ve got to take it and throw one back.”
We do.
Wills Aitkens takes the ensuing kickoff all the way down to the Wesleyan 16. Then, on 4th-and-goal from the 4, Peter Allen takes a Will Allen handoff and cracks it in off-tackle for the score. Collin Rhea converts the point after and it’s 7-7.
The first half ends that way.
“We’ve been given a gift,” Railey says in the locker room. Stillwell agrees. “For us to play this poorly and to still be tied….I know we’re going to play better in the second half. Do we want this season to end tonight?”
A chorus of “No’s” break out through the otherwise silent locker room.
Each coach delivers their spiel. “You said you were going to do whatever it took tonight for us to win,” Mike Thornton yells. “We haven’t done that. Let’s go!”
The words are received; even this reporter wants to don a pair of pads and go play the second half – the half which would decide either a trip to Savannah or the planning of our post-season banquet.
Unfortunately…
Call it fate, call it God’s will, call it the Divine Plan. Regardless, the Football Gods smiled down on the Wolves in the second half. And give them credit – they played a good football game.
On the other hand, however, you ain’t human if you don’t feel for our kids – especially those seniors who have given six years of their time (including JV) to make this trip happen. To see Mo Green wrap up for another tackle. Connor Randall foiling a would-be passer. Collin Rhea stepping up on both sides of the ball and special teams. Rawson Allen recovering from a bone-splitting tackle the week before only to suit up and hit the field again; the spirit of Tucker Lansing, the guts of John Mitchell, the hands of Jack Farrell. There are plenty more.
Regardless, Wesleyan turns a HIES fumble into a score in the third quarter; they would add another TD in the fourth as time and the season runs out on our beloved Bears.
Later…
“I’m disappointed we lost but I’m not disappointed in any one of you guys,” Livezey says. The stadium lights – save one post – are all out. Even Wesleyan has gone in for warmth and next week’s plans.
Our Bears are huddled – no hibernation in sight thank you very much – at around the 15-yard-line.
Livezey himself is at a loss for words. After all, what do you say to a team of kids who have given you their guts, their livers and their spleens for all those years? How do you adequately wish these seniors well and praise them for their efforts? How do you recognize such a young football program already recognized as a power, even though these sentiments aren’t felt at the moment?
Maybe you just do exactly what these young Bears did: They just held on to each other and there were tears. They just slap backs, exchange hugs of respect and look each other in the eye. They huddle and stick close together out of respect and loyalty, out of love for the game, out of love for the program and their school.
True, the Football Gods – and a good Wesleyan football team – has ended this season. But nothing diminishes these positives felt here, these sentiments expressed here.
This is a good group to walk off this field with. This is a good group to share this pain with. This is a good coaching staff to mix in with. “You’re loyal to each other and you love each other – that’s what got us here in the first place,” Stillwell says.
He’s right.
And in spite of the pain – maybe even because of the pain – this feeling makes for a glimmer of hope deep down, a sense of joy, a sense of being in the right place, in the right time and with the right group of kids.
As the last post of lights go out – as the locker room doors open and close for us the last time, as the bus cranks up and takes us through the cold, across town and back home – there’s almost a smile in back of the tears.
After all, you can go through hell if you go through it with the right people.
We love you Bears!
Dunn Neugebauer
Nov. 22, 2008
Saturday, November 15, 2008
A night with the Holy Innocents' football team
Bowdon, GA – 5:15 p.m.
“Okay everybody! It’s time for everyone to get quiet and get focused on what we came here to do.”
With these words, Holy Innocents’ head football coach Ryan Livezey sits down at the front of the rented coach, grabs his clipboard, moves his IPod aside, and stares forward into the mid-November, Bowdon, GA sky.
We’re somewhere between Carrollton and Alabama, somewhere between Atlanta and Nowhere, and we left the school at around 1:45 (1:52 to be exact!) and made the trip across I-285 and I-20, headed west, drove through the drizzle and the autumn clouds.
It was that period between daylight and dusk, and the out-of -window surroundings provided us with absolutely nothing to remember. More drizzle, old houses, businesses that probably closed sometime around when Carter was president, fences, fields, and a two-laned blacktop that would take us, hopefully, to Bowdon High School.
Livezey has his football team in tow, his team only in its third year of varsity football competition. Most programs at that stage are supposed to go – say – 4-6 and out, thanks for the memories and let’s have a fun banquet. But not these overachievers.
They went 7-5 last year; made it to the Final 16 – knocked off region champs Fanin County on the road in their opener before bowing to Pepperell.
This year, with a new classification but just as tough a schedule, they made it through regular season at 7-3, 6-2 in the conference and are now heading north. Or west – for this first round game of the Class A playoffs.
The players obey Livezey’s comment. IPods are pulled out of ears, pads are adjusted, there’s a quiet on the bus but it comes with a non-silent buzz – that buzz of the Friday Night Lights and the playoffs. The sound of pads, the locking of helmets, the sounding of whistles – all that – are soon to follow.
It’s November and it’s postseason.
“If you’re playing football in cold weather you’ve got to be doing something right,” Coach Ron Green said earlier. I think it was Green anyway. Regardless, the comment was accurate.
3:00 p.m. --
The team had rented a hotel in Bremen – the name of the place already forgotten – and the Golden Bears turned a meeting room into a chaired-off version of a football field. After destroying a pregame meal – sandwich, fritos and a power bar – the team moved all chairs out of the way, lined the walls with their bodies, and listened while coaches went through the night ahead.
There are nerves kicking in. A trip to the bathroom is like trying to relieve yourself during a rock concert. You must wait. Players line themselves almost outside the door between meetings.
Some coaches, the trainers and manager are outside watching ESPN and channel surfing while the team waits for the 5:15 bus to take them to the stadium.
“Enough of these sports, let’s watch Oprah,” Trainer Lindsay Law says. To Manager Casey Farrell’s agreement, she clicks off the sports’ experts and changes the channel. Coach Bill Railey gets up in disgust, heads outside to talk to Coach Marshall Gaines about the game. Or about something.
“I don’t like that woman,” Railey mutters as he joins Gaines.
Gaines, for the record, is no stranger to postseason. Besides football, he was on the sideline during the baseball team’s 2007 state title. He’s had his share of pregame meals, tape jobs, chalk talk, pep talk, you name it.
Coaches pace in and out of the meeting room. Each coach delivers his spiel. Father John Porter, along for good luck as well as a good spiritual connection, delivers a speech and a prayer. Father Porter’s energy is felt in the room; his spirit kindles so perfectly with this group of eager, nervous Bears.
“I’m saying it in the present tense,” Porter says. “I AM enjoying this football season because it’s not going to end tonight. Do this as a team. It’s not going to end tonight.”
The players hear, yell, enjoy.
Even Michael Altmeter looks up from his USA Today crossword puzzle and gives a yell.
And now, after a trip from school that included sleep and I-Pod listening, the Bears have now heeded Livezey’s advice and are quiet, staring out the window into nothing, at these rural surroundings that give them nothing else TO think about but the task ahead.
The bus pulls into the school at just after 5:20. The lights aren’t on yet, bleachers are virtually empty. A group of Bowdon Red Devils pace the sloped field at the opposite end and Bowdon parents set up the Admission table.
It’s the pre-game before the pre-game. The walk through. The time to catch the energy and the lay of the land. You don’t coach this, you just go through it. Players glance at the field while walking into the old fieldhouse. Just a glance, they know. Nothing much left to say, no more chalk talk needed thank you very much.
They go inside; several coaches lead them in and close the door.
7:30 p.m. Game time ---
Things become hazy come show time, as hazy as the fog that lifts across the field, obviously clouding the P.A. announcer’s vision. It’s almost funny, but you have to feel for the guy.
This much I did catch…
The Bears won the toss and elected to defer. Both teams are nervous early – a couple of illegal procedure penalties, some missed assignments. Both are three-and-out with the punters getting some early work. John McKay, filling in for the injured Jack Farrell, does a good job of pinning the Red Devils back early.
Regardless, the Bears have to dodge bullets in the first half – three to be exact.
Bullet #1 happens when the Devils drive inside the Bears 30, mostly behind the running of their athletic back (#2, don’t know his name). He twists, turns and eludes some Bear defenders and has his home team knocking on the door.
But on 3rd-and-long, Bear cornerback Peter Allen slips in front of a Red Devil receiver and intercepts a pass, thwarting the first Bowdon drive of the night.
Momentum has shifted for the team being, and the Bear offense gets a couple of first downs on their turn with the ball.
Then comes Bullet #2. Again, the Red Devils are driving. Some more good runs, some timely gains, and Bowdon has the ball 1st-and-goal at the Bear two-yard line.
This is where big teams come up big, however, and the Bears hold them outside the goal three straight plays. After a procedure penalty on the Devils, Bowdon tries a chip shot field goal.
They miss. It’s still 0-0 and why to go Defense!
Bullet #3. Last play of the half. McKay is back near his own goal to punt. After a low snap, McKay scoops it up quickly and punts. It’s blocked and the ball rolls free as the time on the clock reads 0:00. The Bears recover. It’s halftime. It’s still scoreless.
What can you say? Good teams also need good luck at times. We just got some. Perhaps there is something to Father John’s connection. He smiles on the sideline, pats his belly, lifts his fist in the air.
The trainers go off to re-fill the water coolers.
And… the scary moment of the night for the Bears. Rawson Allen, after delivering a bone-crunching tackle, has an injury to his chest area. He’s on the sideline coughing up blood. He is taken away by ambulance…our prayers go with him.
Second half…
The Bears use the good fortune and the breaks of the opening two frames and turn it into momentum the last 24 minutes. The offense comes out inspired.
“They looked like they wanted to be out there,” Livezey would say after the game. “Whether they gained 8 yards or 2 yards, they jumped back up and hustled back to the huddle. The bottom line was passion. They played with passion!”
HIES takes the opening kickoff and shoves it down the Red Devils’ throats. After some timely and excellent runs from running back Jordan Garrett and quarterback Will Allen, the Bears are first-and-goal on the two.
After an option loses two yards, tailback Wills Aitkens breaks the ice. He takes an Allen hand-off and scampers in off left tackle for a four-yard score. The extra point is good.
The Bears, visitors to this fogy land, are up 7-0 with half of the third quarter left.
The defense picks up the momentum – hold Bowdon for another three-and-out. The Bears get the ball back around midfield, pumped up, adrenaline times 12, ready for anything.
On the 26-yard line, Aitkens takes a pitch from Allen and scampers off-tackle. Cutting right and eluding a tackle, the junior takes it to the house for another score. The Bears miss the PAT, but they’re up 13-0 and not taking any crap from anybody.
It ends that way – Bears 13, Bowdon 0. The players gather around the coaches.
9:48 p.m.
“You guys played well, particularly in the second half,” Livezey says. “Now there’s a certain team in Norcross we have to get ready for.”
The players erupt. Just the thought of that “W” word from back home can gear a Bear riled up regardless of the sport.
Wesleyan, you see, has already drubbed Warren County 42-19 tonight in the rain at home. It’s the same Wesleyan team the Bears edged 7-6 back on Week 3, the same Wesleyan team the Bears beat 3-0 last year, eliminating them from post season.
“They’re probably hoping that we won tonight,” Livezey says. “They’re going to be fired up for us.”
The players yell, all hormones and adrenaline, ready for anything. They are released while the Bear spectators, straight off of the Spirit Bus, storm the field. They are led by volleyball star Meg Yanda and tennis stars Jessica and Julia Bailey. Cross country ace Wood Alter and baseball coach Dylan Deal. Volleyball assistant Quinton Walker and parent Teresa McMillan. Graduate parents – Brooke Hawkins, cheerleaders, well-wishers.
It’s a Bear-fest on the Bowdon field and the Bears walk back to the bus slowly to savor the moment. Snacks await them on the bus, something they will jump on like a fumble on a Friday night. Then a bus ride.
A not so quiet ride this time.
No, it’s still football season, you see. It’s the Final 16, just like last year. It’s against rivals Wesleyan.
“They don’t like us,” Livezey says before putting in his IPod on the bus home.
Still, he smiles and throws down his clipboard, the wisdom of no escape if you will. Ron Green grins while he throws snacks across the back of the bus. Father Porter goes to sleep, his job well done. The equipment bus, driven by Forrest Stillwell, follows the coach back to I-20, back to I-285, back through the Atlanta rain.
Home before midnight. Adrenaline still up - Friday night lights still shining in Bear brains. Still, there’s a price to pay for winning – it’s business as usual.
“Films at 2 p.m. Sunday, weight lifting after that, same routine as last week,” Livezey tells his players. “We’ll be under the lights practicing at Riverwood all week."
That’s right folks, you don’t wish for success – you earn it. The Bears yell one last time, clean up their trash, exit the bus one at a time, head off into what’s left of the Friday night.
Drive safely…
Can’t wait till next Friday.
Go Bears!
“Okay everybody! It’s time for everyone to get quiet and get focused on what we came here to do.”
With these words, Holy Innocents’ head football coach Ryan Livezey sits down at the front of the rented coach, grabs his clipboard, moves his IPod aside, and stares forward into the mid-November, Bowdon, GA sky.
We’re somewhere between Carrollton and Alabama, somewhere between Atlanta and Nowhere, and we left the school at around 1:45 (1:52 to be exact!) and made the trip across I-285 and I-20, headed west, drove through the drizzle and the autumn clouds.
It was that period between daylight and dusk, and the out-of -window surroundings provided us with absolutely nothing to remember. More drizzle, old houses, businesses that probably closed sometime around when Carter was president, fences, fields, and a two-laned blacktop that would take us, hopefully, to Bowdon High School.
Livezey has his football team in tow, his team only in its third year of varsity football competition. Most programs at that stage are supposed to go – say – 4-6 and out, thanks for the memories and let’s have a fun banquet. But not these overachievers.
They went 7-5 last year; made it to the Final 16 – knocked off region champs Fanin County on the road in their opener before bowing to Pepperell.
This year, with a new classification but just as tough a schedule, they made it through regular season at 7-3, 6-2 in the conference and are now heading north. Or west – for this first round game of the Class A playoffs.
The players obey Livezey’s comment. IPods are pulled out of ears, pads are adjusted, there’s a quiet on the bus but it comes with a non-silent buzz – that buzz of the Friday Night Lights and the playoffs. The sound of pads, the locking of helmets, the sounding of whistles – all that – are soon to follow.
It’s November and it’s postseason.
“If you’re playing football in cold weather you’ve got to be doing something right,” Coach Ron Green said earlier. I think it was Green anyway. Regardless, the comment was accurate.
3:00 p.m. --
The team had rented a hotel in Bremen – the name of the place already forgotten – and the Golden Bears turned a meeting room into a chaired-off version of a football field. After destroying a pregame meal – sandwich, fritos and a power bar – the team moved all chairs out of the way, lined the walls with their bodies, and listened while coaches went through the night ahead.
There are nerves kicking in. A trip to the bathroom is like trying to relieve yourself during a rock concert. You must wait. Players line themselves almost outside the door between meetings.
Some coaches, the trainers and manager are outside watching ESPN and channel surfing while the team waits for the 5:15 bus to take them to the stadium.
“Enough of these sports, let’s watch Oprah,” Trainer Lindsay Law says. To Manager Casey Farrell’s agreement, she clicks off the sports’ experts and changes the channel. Coach Bill Railey gets up in disgust, heads outside to talk to Coach Marshall Gaines about the game. Or about something.
“I don’t like that woman,” Railey mutters as he joins Gaines.
Gaines, for the record, is no stranger to postseason. Besides football, he was on the sideline during the baseball team’s 2007 state title. He’s had his share of pregame meals, tape jobs, chalk talk, pep talk, you name it.
Coaches pace in and out of the meeting room. Each coach delivers his spiel. Father John Porter, along for good luck as well as a good spiritual connection, delivers a speech and a prayer. Father Porter’s energy is felt in the room; his spirit kindles so perfectly with this group of eager, nervous Bears.
“I’m saying it in the present tense,” Porter says. “I AM enjoying this football season because it’s not going to end tonight. Do this as a team. It’s not going to end tonight.”
The players hear, yell, enjoy.
Even Michael Altmeter looks up from his USA Today crossword puzzle and gives a yell.
And now, after a trip from school that included sleep and I-Pod listening, the Bears have now heeded Livezey’s advice and are quiet, staring out the window into nothing, at these rural surroundings that give them nothing else TO think about but the task ahead.
The bus pulls into the school at just after 5:20. The lights aren’t on yet, bleachers are virtually empty. A group of Bowdon Red Devils pace the sloped field at the opposite end and Bowdon parents set up the Admission table.
It’s the pre-game before the pre-game. The walk through. The time to catch the energy and the lay of the land. You don’t coach this, you just go through it. Players glance at the field while walking into the old fieldhouse. Just a glance, they know. Nothing much left to say, no more chalk talk needed thank you very much.
They go inside; several coaches lead them in and close the door.
7:30 p.m. Game time ---
Things become hazy come show time, as hazy as the fog that lifts across the field, obviously clouding the P.A. announcer’s vision. It’s almost funny, but you have to feel for the guy.
This much I did catch…
The Bears won the toss and elected to defer. Both teams are nervous early – a couple of illegal procedure penalties, some missed assignments. Both are three-and-out with the punters getting some early work. John McKay, filling in for the injured Jack Farrell, does a good job of pinning the Red Devils back early.
Regardless, the Bears have to dodge bullets in the first half – three to be exact.
Bullet #1 happens when the Devils drive inside the Bears 30, mostly behind the running of their athletic back (#2, don’t know his name). He twists, turns and eludes some Bear defenders and has his home team knocking on the door.
But on 3rd-and-long, Bear cornerback Peter Allen slips in front of a Red Devil receiver and intercepts a pass, thwarting the first Bowdon drive of the night.
Momentum has shifted for the team being, and the Bear offense gets a couple of first downs on their turn with the ball.
Then comes Bullet #2. Again, the Red Devils are driving. Some more good runs, some timely gains, and Bowdon has the ball 1st-and-goal at the Bear two-yard line.
This is where big teams come up big, however, and the Bears hold them outside the goal three straight plays. After a procedure penalty on the Devils, Bowdon tries a chip shot field goal.
They miss. It’s still 0-0 and why to go Defense!
Bullet #3. Last play of the half. McKay is back near his own goal to punt. After a low snap, McKay scoops it up quickly and punts. It’s blocked and the ball rolls free as the time on the clock reads 0:00. The Bears recover. It’s halftime. It’s still scoreless.
What can you say? Good teams also need good luck at times. We just got some. Perhaps there is something to Father John’s connection. He smiles on the sideline, pats his belly, lifts his fist in the air.
The trainers go off to re-fill the water coolers.
And… the scary moment of the night for the Bears. Rawson Allen, after delivering a bone-crunching tackle, has an injury to his chest area. He’s on the sideline coughing up blood. He is taken away by ambulance…our prayers go with him.
Second half…
The Bears use the good fortune and the breaks of the opening two frames and turn it into momentum the last 24 minutes. The offense comes out inspired.
“They looked like they wanted to be out there,” Livezey would say after the game. “Whether they gained 8 yards or 2 yards, they jumped back up and hustled back to the huddle. The bottom line was passion. They played with passion!”
HIES takes the opening kickoff and shoves it down the Red Devils’ throats. After some timely and excellent runs from running back Jordan Garrett and quarterback Will Allen, the Bears are first-and-goal on the two.
After an option loses two yards, tailback Wills Aitkens breaks the ice. He takes an Allen hand-off and scampers in off left tackle for a four-yard score. The extra point is good.
The Bears, visitors to this fogy land, are up 7-0 with half of the third quarter left.
The defense picks up the momentum – hold Bowdon for another three-and-out. The Bears get the ball back around midfield, pumped up, adrenaline times 12, ready for anything.
On the 26-yard line, Aitkens takes a pitch from Allen and scampers off-tackle. Cutting right and eluding a tackle, the junior takes it to the house for another score. The Bears miss the PAT, but they’re up 13-0 and not taking any crap from anybody.
It ends that way – Bears 13, Bowdon 0. The players gather around the coaches.
9:48 p.m.
“You guys played well, particularly in the second half,” Livezey says. “Now there’s a certain team in Norcross we have to get ready for.”
The players erupt. Just the thought of that “W” word from back home can gear a Bear riled up regardless of the sport.
Wesleyan, you see, has already drubbed Warren County 42-19 tonight in the rain at home. It’s the same Wesleyan team the Bears edged 7-6 back on Week 3, the same Wesleyan team the Bears beat 3-0 last year, eliminating them from post season.
“They’re probably hoping that we won tonight,” Livezey says. “They’re going to be fired up for us.”
The players yell, all hormones and adrenaline, ready for anything. They are released while the Bear spectators, straight off of the Spirit Bus, storm the field. They are led by volleyball star Meg Yanda and tennis stars Jessica and Julia Bailey. Cross country ace Wood Alter and baseball coach Dylan Deal. Volleyball assistant Quinton Walker and parent Teresa McMillan. Graduate parents – Brooke Hawkins, cheerleaders, well-wishers.
It’s a Bear-fest on the Bowdon field and the Bears walk back to the bus slowly to savor the moment. Snacks await them on the bus, something they will jump on like a fumble on a Friday night. Then a bus ride.
A not so quiet ride this time.
No, it’s still football season, you see. It’s the Final 16, just like last year. It’s against rivals Wesleyan.
“They don’t like us,” Livezey says before putting in his IPod on the bus home.
Still, he smiles and throws down his clipboard, the wisdom of no escape if you will. Ron Green grins while he throws snacks across the back of the bus. Father Porter goes to sleep, his job well done. The equipment bus, driven by Forrest Stillwell, follows the coach back to I-20, back to I-285, back through the Atlanta rain.
Home before midnight. Adrenaline still up - Friday night lights still shining in Bear brains. Still, there’s a price to pay for winning – it’s business as usual.
“Films at 2 p.m. Sunday, weight lifting after that, same routine as last week,” Livezey tells his players. “We’ll be under the lights practicing at Riverwood all week."
That’s right folks, you don’t wish for success – you earn it. The Bears yell one last time, clean up their trash, exit the bus one at a time, head off into what’s left of the Friday night.
Drive safely…
Can’t wait till next Friday.
Go Bears!
Friday, November 7, 2008
Date Report - Volume 14
Re: Sunday night’s date
From: Feb. 24th, 2008
Author: Dunn Neugebauer
Additional comments: Please help
I left the house remembering all three rules of dating. 1) Don’t burp; 2) don’t fart; and 3) Hide all John Denver and Bee Gees CD’s under the car seat where she’ll think I’m cool.
I was dressed casually (jockstrap and sunglasses), while she looked suave in her jeans and sweater tied around her neck. We went Mexican – some place with a normal Mexican name that I’ve already forgotten. The hostess spoke no English and didn’t understand my dialect of ‘southern mixed with hangover’.
The subject of conversation was simple – OUR MIXED ALTA TEAM! In my story, of course, I was the hero – diving into the fence for loose balls, hitting magnificent shots between my legs and even banging my face into the net post between games just for pure adrenaline. She was impressed (either that or she feared I was lying). The damn waiter kept interrupting my lies – I mean, my story – by bringing us food and Corona beers. Couldn’t remember where the truth ended and my journalistic license began.
Fast forward: Not knowing whether we’re “just friends” or advancing into the stage of TV dinners by the fireplace while watching re-runs of Columbo in a romantic heap, I was very confidence-lacking as I walked her to the door. Still, being a member of the Final Four ALTA team and mustering up full nerve, I made the big move at the door, opting for the hug with a suck-on-her-face wrestling maneuver.
She turned her head and I ended up kissing her somewhere along the left ear lobe. For the record, sticking your tongue in a looped ear ring is not for the faint hearted and please, please, do not try this at home. She laughed, while I was speechless and literally, tongue tied.
Advice needed: Please send all help and correspondence to “Dear Dunny”. Deadline for submissions is next Tuesday (she’s going out of town I was told). Need help.
Sincerely,
Single in Atlanta and starting to get used to it,
Dunn Neugebauer
ALTA team member
Sportswriter
Nerd
From: Feb. 24th, 2008
Author: Dunn Neugebauer
Additional comments: Please help
I left the house remembering all three rules of dating. 1) Don’t burp; 2) don’t fart; and 3) Hide all John Denver and Bee Gees CD’s under the car seat where she’ll think I’m cool.
I was dressed casually (jockstrap and sunglasses), while she looked suave in her jeans and sweater tied around her neck. We went Mexican – some place with a normal Mexican name that I’ve already forgotten. The hostess spoke no English and didn’t understand my dialect of ‘southern mixed with hangover’.
The subject of conversation was simple – OUR MIXED ALTA TEAM! In my story, of course, I was the hero – diving into the fence for loose balls, hitting magnificent shots between my legs and even banging my face into the net post between games just for pure adrenaline. She was impressed (either that or she feared I was lying). The damn waiter kept interrupting my lies – I mean, my story – by bringing us food and Corona beers. Couldn’t remember where the truth ended and my journalistic license began.
Fast forward: Not knowing whether we’re “just friends” or advancing into the stage of TV dinners by the fireplace while watching re-runs of Columbo in a romantic heap, I was very confidence-lacking as I walked her to the door. Still, being a member of the Final Four ALTA team and mustering up full nerve, I made the big move at the door, opting for the hug with a suck-on-her-face wrestling maneuver.
She turned her head and I ended up kissing her somewhere along the left ear lobe. For the record, sticking your tongue in a looped ear ring is not for the faint hearted and please, please, do not try this at home. She laughed, while I was speechless and literally, tongue tied.
Advice needed: Please send all help and correspondence to “Dear Dunny”. Deadline for submissions is next Tuesday (she’s going out of town I was told). Need help.
Sincerely,
Single in Atlanta and starting to get used to it,
Dunn Neugebauer
ALTA team member
Sportswriter
Nerd
Monday, November 3, 2008
Meditations from a cross country meet
I want this night to be a celebration. A celebration of injuries healed, illnesses overcome, and guts. Lots of guts.
I want this night to be a celebration because I love runners. Because they’re a little bit skinny and a whole lot warped; because their sense of humor is way left of center and they are all angles and elbows, ribs and jawbones.
Maybe I love runners because they give up their weekends while others are home in bed with their electric blankets up somewhere between bake and broil; still others watching the TIVO edition of Grey’s Anatomy or House.
Maybe because they say things like Amelia Foster did: “Coach, you lied to me. There are no fat kids here!” This is Amelia – the one who lined up in Alabama with one shoe on and the other back in Georgia. The one who played the fiddle or the violin or whatever it was before region.
Then there’s Christina Touzet – the one who completed a 50-minute run and caught 20 fish in the middle of it. I told her to run a 24 and she thought I was talking about the television show. The one who took an innocent 4-mile run and said, “Let’s stop at Natalie’s house for some water. Want to?” Or: “Coach, can I just run from right here to over there and then come back?”
As you get older, you can arrogantly think you’ve seen and heard it all. To know Touzet, however, is to know completely different.
Maybe I love runners because sometimes they get so excited they wet the bus, literary. Or they say things like: I love cross country! Except for the running part. Or, my own personal favorite: Did you just put a booger on my pants?
There’s Kyle Donahue, speaking of wetting the bus. He began this season by putting himself in Group 17 at running camp last summer. Seventeen out of a possible 18! He just ran a 17:21, his best ever and top-10 best in school history. He just shrugged and went off to engulf a pizza.
There’s William Ward, who can quote Nietzsche or Kurt Cobain, who just ran a 1:30 better than last week’s time. He can’t run that fast…but he did. And Avery Robinson – God did you just see Avery Robinson? She just took off her boot, ran a 24 on one leg. She’s cussing her ‘stupid ankle’, tossing her boot aside and telling us she’s grumpy. I tell her grumpy for her is happy for most people. She just puts on a smile that will light up tomorrow. God don’t you love these kids.
Christina Callaway just left with her cupcakes. She’s got this big smile – all teeth and lips. She just ran the best race of her life; she and her mother are off in the urban assault vehicle. She left with her head held high and she should. She overcame chest problems and changes in medicines.
Look at Thomas Menk, he just ran an 18:58; his goal at season’s beginning was to break 21. Drew Wilkins is passed out at the finish line; I think he’s dead. He looks like he’s passing a kidney stone. I asked him how he was feeling – he was polite enough not to flip me the finger.
And speaking of guts, did you just see Greer Gafford? The one with her hair bobbing back and forth, the girl so skinny she could blend into wallpaper? She just followed Christine for 3.1 miles, ran a 20:07, overcame her nervousness, obstacles, projections be darned.
She was crying at the starting line – I guess the combination of Neugebauer, Kohl, Myers and Rahmeier can do that to anybody. Not to be sadistic, but it worked. Now she and her new car are off to Carrollton, off to state, to chartered territory.
Christine Georgakakos with the name everybody mispronounces. She runs the 5K, gets home, goes to Tophat Soccer. She’ll finish state on Saturday and jump straight into the pool, only to go back on the soccer field again come spring. Don’t you love that kid. Put it this way, if you don’t, you ain’t human. Period. End of story.
Maybe I love runners because they’re like Kate Borden, who can’t remember a thing after the second mile. That’s because she fainted, and ended up in the medical tent. Sadistic again, but don’t you love the guts?
There’s Wood Alter, - built like a lumberjack - who told me last spring he was going to run. My first thought was, “Run what?” He just improved his season time by six minutes, literally a mile. Name that man captain and clone him immediately.
Lucas Erlacher, the Italian Stallion. I’m not sure if he can speak English or not yet, but I do know he almost throttled me a minute ago. I told him he ran a 20 flat instead of a 19:59. He was quick to correct me. Still, he smiles and he should – he just beat his time by a light year.
Theo – the greatest JV runner in the history of the school. His keys are lost, his shoes are in his car, the map to the race in his locker. He’ll collect it all somehow, get himself together, win the race. Can’t wait until next year.
Maybe I like the runner because they get Tourette’s Syndrome on the third mile; their face looks like a Halloween mask on steroids. Or they’re like J.B. Meathe and they jump a fence one day and end up with stitches in their foot. He doesn’t tell me – instead just laces up, runs, he with his hole-in-one in golf already under his belt.
There’s Laura Capps, who ran the whole season on one foot, John Aldridge who led his team to the best year ever, Alex Hovancik, who limped his way across the finish line, and all 52 pounds of Callie Bergin. Chandler McMullen, who couldn’t complete warm-ups on opening day and is now competing for captain.
How do you salute these people who just gave you their insides? Who turned up their guts, their livers and their spleens and have no idea why or how? Who couldn’t come up with the answer when you ask them why they run?
Maybe I, as a writer will steal from J.P. Kinsella when summing them up.
Or maybe I’ll just call them up one at a time, tell them I’m glad I got to meet them. Tell them I’m glad I get to shake their hands. Tell them I appreciate them for who they are and for what they’ve done.
Thank you.
Dunn Neugebauer
Oct. 31, 2008
I want this night to be a celebration because I love runners. Because they’re a little bit skinny and a whole lot warped; because their sense of humor is way left of center and they are all angles and elbows, ribs and jawbones.
Maybe I love runners because they give up their weekends while others are home in bed with their electric blankets up somewhere between bake and broil; still others watching the TIVO edition of Grey’s Anatomy or House.
Maybe because they say things like Amelia Foster did: “Coach, you lied to me. There are no fat kids here!” This is Amelia – the one who lined up in Alabama with one shoe on and the other back in Georgia. The one who played the fiddle or the violin or whatever it was before region.
Then there’s Christina Touzet – the one who completed a 50-minute run and caught 20 fish in the middle of it. I told her to run a 24 and she thought I was talking about the television show. The one who took an innocent 4-mile run and said, “Let’s stop at Natalie’s house for some water. Want to?” Or: “Coach, can I just run from right here to over there and then come back?”
As you get older, you can arrogantly think you’ve seen and heard it all. To know Touzet, however, is to know completely different.
Maybe I love runners because sometimes they get so excited they wet the bus, literary. Or they say things like: I love cross country! Except for the running part. Or, my own personal favorite: Did you just put a booger on my pants?
There’s Kyle Donahue, speaking of wetting the bus. He began this season by putting himself in Group 17 at running camp last summer. Seventeen out of a possible 18! He just ran a 17:21, his best ever and top-10 best in school history. He just shrugged and went off to engulf a pizza.
There’s William Ward, who can quote Nietzsche or Kurt Cobain, who just ran a 1:30 better than last week’s time. He can’t run that fast…but he did. And Avery Robinson – God did you just see Avery Robinson? She just took off her boot, ran a 24 on one leg. She’s cussing her ‘stupid ankle’, tossing her boot aside and telling us she’s grumpy. I tell her grumpy for her is happy for most people. She just puts on a smile that will light up tomorrow. God don’t you love these kids.
Christina Callaway just left with her cupcakes. She’s got this big smile – all teeth and lips. She just ran the best race of her life; she and her mother are off in the urban assault vehicle. She left with her head held high and she should. She overcame chest problems and changes in medicines.
Look at Thomas Menk, he just ran an 18:58; his goal at season’s beginning was to break 21. Drew Wilkins is passed out at the finish line; I think he’s dead. He looks like he’s passing a kidney stone. I asked him how he was feeling – he was polite enough not to flip me the finger.
And speaking of guts, did you just see Greer Gafford? The one with her hair bobbing back and forth, the girl so skinny she could blend into wallpaper? She just followed Christine for 3.1 miles, ran a 20:07, overcame her nervousness, obstacles, projections be darned.
She was crying at the starting line – I guess the combination of Neugebauer, Kohl, Myers and Rahmeier can do that to anybody. Not to be sadistic, but it worked. Now she and her new car are off to Carrollton, off to state, to chartered territory.
Christine Georgakakos with the name everybody mispronounces. She runs the 5K, gets home, goes to Tophat Soccer. She’ll finish state on Saturday and jump straight into the pool, only to go back on the soccer field again come spring. Don’t you love that kid. Put it this way, if you don’t, you ain’t human. Period. End of story.
Maybe I love runners because they’re like Kate Borden, who can’t remember a thing after the second mile. That’s because she fainted, and ended up in the medical tent. Sadistic again, but don’t you love the guts?
There’s Wood Alter, - built like a lumberjack - who told me last spring he was going to run. My first thought was, “Run what?” He just improved his season time by six minutes, literally a mile. Name that man captain and clone him immediately.
Lucas Erlacher, the Italian Stallion. I’m not sure if he can speak English or not yet, but I do know he almost throttled me a minute ago. I told him he ran a 20 flat instead of a 19:59. He was quick to correct me. Still, he smiles and he should – he just beat his time by a light year.
Theo – the greatest JV runner in the history of the school. His keys are lost, his shoes are in his car, the map to the race in his locker. He’ll collect it all somehow, get himself together, win the race. Can’t wait until next year.
Maybe I like the runner because they get Tourette’s Syndrome on the third mile; their face looks like a Halloween mask on steroids. Or they’re like J.B. Meathe and they jump a fence one day and end up with stitches in their foot. He doesn’t tell me – instead just laces up, runs, he with his hole-in-one in golf already under his belt.
There’s Laura Capps, who ran the whole season on one foot, John Aldridge who led his team to the best year ever, Alex Hovancik, who limped his way across the finish line, and all 52 pounds of Callie Bergin. Chandler McMullen, who couldn’t complete warm-ups on opening day and is now competing for captain.
How do you salute these people who just gave you their insides? Who turned up their guts, their livers and their spleens and have no idea why or how? Who couldn’t come up with the answer when you ask them why they run?
Maybe I, as a writer will steal from J.P. Kinsella when summing them up.
Or maybe I’ll just call them up one at a time, tell them I’m glad I got to meet them. Tell them I’m glad I get to shake their hands. Tell them I appreciate them for who they are and for what they’ve done.
Thank you.
Dunn Neugebauer
Oct. 31, 2008
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Memories, title games and a phone call
As Holy Innocents’ girls basketball coach Buster Brown walks into the Macon Convention Center, he has no trouble remembering the last time he was on the floor of a high school state basketball game. No trouble at all.
First, you just don’t forget going to the finals in state basketball and second, how could he forget what happened the night he got there?
He was a junior at the now defunct Wills High School in Smyrna – playing against Sandy Springs. In the first quarter, one of his teammates took a charge, got his head slammed into the hardwood with such force that blood immediately poured from the back of his head. Right in front of some cheerleaders, who promptly passed out from shock.
In the fourth quarter – inside of three minutes – the manger’s father died in the stands of a heart attack.
Oh, and as for the game, they lost by three.
“I’ve been waiting for 30 years to get back here,” Brown said after last Friday’s 60-51 win over Tri-County. Thirty years…
The scene is a little different now – with the Bear leader now striding with 14 girls in tow – subregion and region champions. A team of overachievers who were picked to go …let’s say 14-8 and out and thanks for the memories.
Two starters quit, another gets hurt and how can you not be proud of where you are and who you’re walking in with? Brown is approached by a reporter who asks, “Did you ever expect to be here?” Coaches have to choose words carefully, but not now. “No.”
He answers other questions but for now he just wants to look around. He’s back. Okay, Richard Nixon is no longer president, the Beatles have come and gone, Vietnam is over, times have changed. But he’s back.
And only Putnam County –those 27-1, fast, athletic Eagles are in the way – with the entire city of Eatonton sitting in the stands, screaming against his young Bears.
One win away. What do you do when your dream comes true? Or if not, what do you say – how do you keep going? He knows this walk into this gym comes with a price – one way or the other.
The place is packed. The Bears students, in from spring break, straggle in sporting their tans. Alumni comes in. Well-wishers, parents, coaching foes.
Such a good scenario that, even though the dream is oh so close, he sits in his chair – THE chair - and thinks, “This is fun.”
But back to the fans. Brown’s wife won’t be there. Period. “I only go when our son comes home and makes me go,” Sandy Brown says. “I can’t take it.”
So while Brown straightens his tie, talks to his girls, remembers just what he saw on last night’s tape, his wife paces the floor in Marietta, watches TV, sits on the couch, anything to take her mind off of what’s going on with her husband’s team.
She’s used to this…being a basketball widow. Her husband, you see, is a very dedicated man. He takes his team from camp to camp, tournament to tournament, often getting home after midnight only to throw in the tape and study it. And study it.
Oh he always calls. The phone always rings; the end is something any wife or fan has to prepare for. A jumping up and down or an offer of condolences, either can happen after The Call.
Two years ago, it was a Final Four loss to Treutlen. At Mt. Vernon three straight trips. Last year, a disappointing region semifinal blemish to Model, ending a 22-2 year without even a drive to Macon.
Twenty-one years he’s been coaching. Twenty-one. The drives, the tapes, the camps, the X’s, the O’s. and now he’s sitting with more than 300 wins under his belt, a number more of a nuisance than anything else, especially with the ragging he takes from his fellow coaches.
“Three hundred wins and you get served first at a restaurant. When you win three hundred, you get to host sub-region tournaments. When you win 300…”
He laughs. But 300-plus wins plus a trip to the big game?
Two hours pass and on the outside, he’s still under control. You see, when you win 300 games, people can shake that off and say it’s because you’re old. But when you win 300 games, and sit in the chair in THE game, then what do you say? Did you say the right thing to those 14 beautiful people who surrounded you in the locker room?
Then again, what do you say? How do you handle it when your dream pops with the shooting of a free throw, the blowing of a whistle and the sounding of a horn?
To quote from Ray Kinsella, “Maybe you just shake their hand, tell them you love them, you’re glad you got to know them and you appreciate them for who they are and for what they’ve done.”
And then you all put your heads down and cry awhile. But they’re not all sad tears. You will be back. And in back of all those tears, a smile is there.
There has to be. You were there. Look at all those who weren’t; many of them still in the stands. Specatators.
“It’s so neat for those kids to be a part of all this. Playing basketball on TV, being in the coliseum, playing in that game.”
You tell your players to use this as a springboard and they will. You don’t come this close and forget. You hold your loved one awhile, then you walk outside, heads up.
As the city of Eatonton gets up and drives back home. The TV crew in Macon gets ready for the next game. Reporters head home and get ready for spring sports. Parents collect their loved ones and hug them all.
And in Marietta, a phone rings. Nervously, Sandy Brown walks across the floor and picks it up.
First, you just don’t forget going to the finals in state basketball and second, how could he forget what happened the night he got there?
He was a junior at the now defunct Wills High School in Smyrna – playing against Sandy Springs. In the first quarter, one of his teammates took a charge, got his head slammed into the hardwood with such force that blood immediately poured from the back of his head. Right in front of some cheerleaders, who promptly passed out from shock.
In the fourth quarter – inside of three minutes – the manger’s father died in the stands of a heart attack.
Oh, and as for the game, they lost by three.
“I’ve been waiting for 30 years to get back here,” Brown said after last Friday’s 60-51 win over Tri-County. Thirty years…
The scene is a little different now – with the Bear leader now striding with 14 girls in tow – subregion and region champions. A team of overachievers who were picked to go …let’s say 14-8 and out and thanks for the memories.
Two starters quit, another gets hurt and how can you not be proud of where you are and who you’re walking in with? Brown is approached by a reporter who asks, “Did you ever expect to be here?” Coaches have to choose words carefully, but not now. “No.”
He answers other questions but for now he just wants to look around. He’s back. Okay, Richard Nixon is no longer president, the Beatles have come and gone, Vietnam is over, times have changed. But he’s back.
And only Putnam County –those 27-1, fast, athletic Eagles are in the way – with the entire city of Eatonton sitting in the stands, screaming against his young Bears.
One win away. What do you do when your dream comes true? Or if not, what do you say – how do you keep going? He knows this walk into this gym comes with a price – one way or the other.
The place is packed. The Bears students, in from spring break, straggle in sporting their tans. Alumni comes in. Well-wishers, parents, coaching foes.
Such a good scenario that, even though the dream is oh so close, he sits in his chair – THE chair - and thinks, “This is fun.”
But back to the fans. Brown’s wife won’t be there. Period. “I only go when our son comes home and makes me go,” Sandy Brown says. “I can’t take it.”
So while Brown straightens his tie, talks to his girls, remembers just what he saw on last night’s tape, his wife paces the floor in Marietta, watches TV, sits on the couch, anything to take her mind off of what’s going on with her husband’s team.
She’s used to this…being a basketball widow. Her husband, you see, is a very dedicated man. He takes his team from camp to camp, tournament to tournament, often getting home after midnight only to throw in the tape and study it. And study it.
Oh he always calls. The phone always rings; the end is something any wife or fan has to prepare for. A jumping up and down or an offer of condolences, either can happen after The Call.
Two years ago, it was a Final Four loss to Treutlen. At Mt. Vernon three straight trips. Last year, a disappointing region semifinal blemish to Model, ending a 22-2 year without even a drive to Macon.
Twenty-one years he’s been coaching. Twenty-one. The drives, the tapes, the camps, the X’s, the O’s. and now he’s sitting with more than 300 wins under his belt, a number more of a nuisance than anything else, especially with the ragging he takes from his fellow coaches.
“Three hundred wins and you get served first at a restaurant. When you win three hundred, you get to host sub-region tournaments. When you win 300…”
He laughs. But 300-plus wins plus a trip to the big game?
Two hours pass and on the outside, he’s still under control. You see, when you win 300 games, people can shake that off and say it’s because you’re old. But when you win 300 games, and sit in the chair in THE game, then what do you say? Did you say the right thing to those 14 beautiful people who surrounded you in the locker room?
Then again, what do you say? How do you handle it when your dream pops with the shooting of a free throw, the blowing of a whistle and the sounding of a horn?
To quote from Ray Kinsella, “Maybe you just shake their hand, tell them you love them, you’re glad you got to know them and you appreciate them for who they are and for what they’ve done.”
And then you all put your heads down and cry awhile. But they’re not all sad tears. You will be back. And in back of all those tears, a smile is there.
There has to be. You were there. Look at all those who weren’t; many of them still in the stands. Specatators.
“It’s so neat for those kids to be a part of all this. Playing basketball on TV, being in the coliseum, playing in that game.”
You tell your players to use this as a springboard and they will. You don’t come this close and forget. You hold your loved one awhile, then you walk outside, heads up.
As the city of Eatonton gets up and drives back home. The TV crew in Macon gets ready for the next game. Reporters head home and get ready for spring sports. Parents collect their loved ones and hug them all.
And in Marietta, a phone rings. Nervously, Sandy Brown walks across the floor and picks it up.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
True love for a sad case
I was a sad case really.
I hid it the best I could in the younger years; hid behind lockers when the bully walked down the hall, pretended to be upset when the spinner didn't land on me in Spin the Bottle, purposefully raised my hand late in class and acted disappointed when the teacher didn't call on me.
There's an invisible spotlight that finds us all, however, and in the case of adolescence, it's called your 16th birthday. Two things happen then: 1) you're supposed to learn to drive and 2) once you master Rule 1, you must now take girls out on a date. Rule 2, of course, carries several addendums such as, a) do I call her sober or can I sneak a few shots out of the parent's liquor cabinets; b) do I ask her straight out, call her or do I ask John to tell Gene to tell Cindy to tell....
You remember the drill. Hopefully you don't if you were sane in your youth.
Part "b" was the toughest: This consisted of dialing six digits of her phone number, hanging up, dialing all seven, hanging up, then rejoicing when you called all seven and the line was busy.
Finally, you get her on the line. She knows you're going to ask her out and you know you're going to ask her out, so there's silence. And more silence. And you learn, even as a ripe teenager, that sometimes there isn't a sound louder in the world than pure silence. Finally, you ask. She accepts. You exhale 643 pounds of adolescent energy. The air is now fit for breathing.
So there we were. It was late; we'd already done the go-to-Athens-for-dinner-and-a-movie thing. The Beatles had already played through twice on my 8-track player. Conversation had run stale, dry, then completely out. The changing channels of the 8- track were getting louder, a big comparison to the silence between my date and me.
Finally, it happened. She asked me the question most teenagers would have traded all their baseball cards for: Do you want to get in the back seat? The silence was ... seriously heavy. Thick. Dense. Forever. Birds quit chirping. The 8-track tape player paused. The stars and moon moved closer, waiting. "No thanks," I finally replied. "I think I'll stay up front with you."
Yes, it started bad. And it only got worse.
High school ended (thank God) and off I went to college life. Ah, the life of freedom. Living in dorms. Away from home. No curfew. No having to wear clothes that matched all the time. The pleasure of wearing the same jeans over and over and over, washing them be darned.
One of the first weekends there, my doubles partner picked up a woman. To prove his manhood, he picked one up for me, too. I knew then that I had a serious friend on my hands. I hadn't felt that honored since first grade when my teacher made me stick my nose in a circle drawn in the chalkboard.
"Now who wants to join him?" the teacher asked angrily.
It was Don Gilbert who threw up his hand.
"I do, I do!"
True friends. They don't make 'em like they used to.
Sorry, back to the story:
"Come on, man, we're going back to your room."
My double's partner was smiling so big his mustache was shaking back and forth in exuberance, and he and his date were already in the back seat ready to go. Me, I'd never even had a beer with someone with a mustache, much less taken he, his woman and one for me back home.
But there we were. In my room. Two girls, two boys. Oops, actually it was considered politically correct to consider us men and women now, though what happened on my drive from Madison to Rome that converted me I'll never know. All I did was slam on some ELO, the Who, and some Beach Boys and there I was in non-record time.
Sorry, I digress once again.
Things were getting serious. Jimbo and his date were on my couch. There was nowhere for me and my "date" to sit but on the bed. In a panic, my eyes scanned all corners of the room for an alternative. None existed. So we sat. I tried small talk, then realized I wasn't capable. She, being more mature at that age naturally and way more mature anyway, was years away from small talk when it came down to it. She put her hands on my lips to shut me up. She moved closer. She put her hand on my stomach, about to make the BIG move.
And I laughed like I've never laughed before. "What's wrong?" "That tickles." She tried again, and again, and again. Laughter every time.
Jimbo pulled me aside. Tried to explain. Threatened my manhood. Promised that tomorrow's first serve would find its way into the back of my skull. Promised my reputation would owe points on the scale of 1-10.
Nothing worked. A human hand on my stomach equaled laughter. Sorry, that's the way it was.
Over the summer, I was at a camp in the mountains of New Hampshire. As promised and like a good little "man", I called home to talk to mom and dad. "I hate to cut this short folks, but Julie and I are about to leave campus and go looking for a moose."
I could hear the pride in my dad's voice. The relief. The Ode to Joy that Beethoven had always promised him. I could feel it 2,100 miles away, up the entire east coast from Georgia to New Hampshire. I could've sworn I heard him tell mom, "Shirley, good news, Dunn does date after all." Maybe that was my imagination. Actually, I think he said, "That's a likely story, son." It was mother who put a dagger through his heart. "No, you don't understand," she cut in. "He REALLY IS going looking for a moose."
I was. We were. We saw one, too. It was a baby - a calf I think it's called - but by God we found one. It was big and ugly and goofy, but man what a successful night it was.
It was a year later, at that same camp, when IT happened. I think God finally got tired of laughing at me. Maybe he pitied my mom and dad. Regardless, she was single and she was cute and she was smart and she was funny and she was sweet. Translation: she scared the crap out of me."Run for the hills!" my inner voice would say.
So I did. Steve Prefontaine, the great runner of the 70's, would've been proud. I had his stamina and could hide better than eight of the ten most wanted. No one could find me. Then again, probably no one looked.
Still, it was a hornet that ended my charade called a love life, just a hornet and nothing more. I was walking to a meeting; had my head down behind my clipboard and was heading straight, the shortest direction between two points. I tripped over a bush. The hornets came out. Most of them passed. One of them did not. He stung my index finger. The pain was intense.
Immediately I jogged to the nurse's station. Guess who the nurse was?
"What happened?" she said.
Being tongue tied, no syllables emerged. "Would you believe I got head butted by a pileated woodpecker?" I finally replied.
She laughed. I had to admit, that was pretty funny for me.
"Come back tonight. I'll see about it."
My friends congratulated me, patted me on the back, gave me high-fives, low-fives, butt slaps, whatever the going craze was. Me, I turned red.
That night, after hours, I visited her in the health center. She closed the door. We were all alone. Just me. And her. The world stopped. After looking at my hand, she got down to business. Gazing into my eyes, she dropped her head, raised it again, and spoke.
"It's like this," she said. "I've found this book club we ought to join. We can get eight books for a dollar each. I figure you can get four, I can get four, then we can split the cost on the three we have to buy."
Ah, true love at last...
I hid it the best I could in the younger years; hid behind lockers when the bully walked down the hall, pretended to be upset when the spinner didn't land on me in Spin the Bottle, purposefully raised my hand late in class and acted disappointed when the teacher didn't call on me.
There's an invisible spotlight that finds us all, however, and in the case of adolescence, it's called your 16th birthday. Two things happen then: 1) you're supposed to learn to drive and 2) once you master Rule 1, you must now take girls out on a date. Rule 2, of course, carries several addendums such as, a) do I call her sober or can I sneak a few shots out of the parent's liquor cabinets; b) do I ask her straight out, call her or do I ask John to tell Gene to tell Cindy to tell....
You remember the drill. Hopefully you don't if you were sane in your youth.
Part "b" was the toughest: This consisted of dialing six digits of her phone number, hanging up, dialing all seven, hanging up, then rejoicing when you called all seven and the line was busy.
Finally, you get her on the line. She knows you're going to ask her out and you know you're going to ask her out, so there's silence. And more silence. And you learn, even as a ripe teenager, that sometimes there isn't a sound louder in the world than pure silence. Finally, you ask. She accepts. You exhale 643 pounds of adolescent energy. The air is now fit for breathing.
So there we were. It was late; we'd already done the go-to-Athens-for-dinner-and-a-movie thing. The Beatles had already played through twice on my 8-track player. Conversation had run stale, dry, then completely out. The changing channels of the 8- track were getting louder, a big comparison to the silence between my date and me.
Finally, it happened. She asked me the question most teenagers would have traded all their baseball cards for: Do you want to get in the back seat? The silence was ... seriously heavy. Thick. Dense. Forever. Birds quit chirping. The 8-track tape player paused. The stars and moon moved closer, waiting. "No thanks," I finally replied. "I think I'll stay up front with you."
Yes, it started bad. And it only got worse.
High school ended (thank God) and off I went to college life. Ah, the life of freedom. Living in dorms. Away from home. No curfew. No having to wear clothes that matched all the time. The pleasure of wearing the same jeans over and over and over, washing them be darned.
One of the first weekends there, my doubles partner picked up a woman. To prove his manhood, he picked one up for me, too. I knew then that I had a serious friend on my hands. I hadn't felt that honored since first grade when my teacher made me stick my nose in a circle drawn in the chalkboard.
"Now who wants to join him?" the teacher asked angrily.
It was Don Gilbert who threw up his hand.
"I do, I do!"
True friends. They don't make 'em like they used to.
Sorry, back to the story:
"Come on, man, we're going back to your room."
My double's partner was smiling so big his mustache was shaking back and forth in exuberance, and he and his date were already in the back seat ready to go. Me, I'd never even had a beer with someone with a mustache, much less taken he, his woman and one for me back home.
But there we were. In my room. Two girls, two boys. Oops, actually it was considered politically correct to consider us men and women now, though what happened on my drive from Madison to Rome that converted me I'll never know. All I did was slam on some ELO, the Who, and some Beach Boys and there I was in non-record time.
Sorry, I digress once again.
Things were getting serious. Jimbo and his date were on my couch. There was nowhere for me and my "date" to sit but on the bed. In a panic, my eyes scanned all corners of the room for an alternative. None existed. So we sat. I tried small talk, then realized I wasn't capable. She, being more mature at that age naturally and way more mature anyway, was years away from small talk when it came down to it. She put her hands on my lips to shut me up. She moved closer. She put her hand on my stomach, about to make the BIG move.
And I laughed like I've never laughed before. "What's wrong?" "That tickles." She tried again, and again, and again. Laughter every time.
Jimbo pulled me aside. Tried to explain. Threatened my manhood. Promised that tomorrow's first serve would find its way into the back of my skull. Promised my reputation would owe points on the scale of 1-10.
Nothing worked. A human hand on my stomach equaled laughter. Sorry, that's the way it was.
Over the summer, I was at a camp in the mountains of New Hampshire. As promised and like a good little "man", I called home to talk to mom and dad. "I hate to cut this short folks, but Julie and I are about to leave campus and go looking for a moose."
I could hear the pride in my dad's voice. The relief. The Ode to Joy that Beethoven had always promised him. I could feel it 2,100 miles away, up the entire east coast from Georgia to New Hampshire. I could've sworn I heard him tell mom, "Shirley, good news, Dunn does date after all." Maybe that was my imagination. Actually, I think he said, "That's a likely story, son." It was mother who put a dagger through his heart. "No, you don't understand," she cut in. "He REALLY IS going looking for a moose."
I was. We were. We saw one, too. It was a baby - a calf I think it's called - but by God we found one. It was big and ugly and goofy, but man what a successful night it was.
It was a year later, at that same camp, when IT happened. I think God finally got tired of laughing at me. Maybe he pitied my mom and dad. Regardless, she was single and she was cute and she was smart and she was funny and she was sweet. Translation: she scared the crap out of me."Run for the hills!" my inner voice would say.
So I did. Steve Prefontaine, the great runner of the 70's, would've been proud. I had his stamina and could hide better than eight of the ten most wanted. No one could find me. Then again, probably no one looked.
Still, it was a hornet that ended my charade called a love life, just a hornet and nothing more. I was walking to a meeting; had my head down behind my clipboard and was heading straight, the shortest direction between two points. I tripped over a bush. The hornets came out. Most of them passed. One of them did not. He stung my index finger. The pain was intense.
Immediately I jogged to the nurse's station. Guess who the nurse was?
"What happened?" she said.
Being tongue tied, no syllables emerged. "Would you believe I got head butted by a pileated woodpecker?" I finally replied.
She laughed. I had to admit, that was pretty funny for me.
"Come back tonight. I'll see about it."
My friends congratulated me, patted me on the back, gave me high-fives, low-fives, butt slaps, whatever the going craze was. Me, I turned red.
That night, after hours, I visited her in the health center. She closed the door. We were all alone. Just me. And her. The world stopped. After looking at my hand, she got down to business. Gazing into my eyes, she dropped her head, raised it again, and spoke.
"It's like this," she said. "I've found this book club we ought to join. We can get eight books for a dollar each. I figure you can get four, I can get four, then we can split the cost on the three we have to buy."
Ah, true love at last...
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Meditations from the middle of nowhere
Worries and wonderings in preseason from a head football coach
It’s 6:30 a.m. Do you know where your football team is? You haven’t had your coffee, nor a chance to bond with your wife or girls, but already the questions mount. I mean, you were 7-5 last year and went to the playoffs and you’re supposed to be good this year. Still, you wonder. Will we be? Can we be?
Thoughts follow you to breakfast, nudge you while you sip your coffee, sit poised at the tip of your brain while you make small talk. The fence in your head is getting wider, opening the door for more agenda, more questions, more problems.
Get the copies to the coaches. Send Coach Railey and Green out to line the field. Work out the new offense with Coach Green. Pray to the Good Lord above nobody gets hurt.
Are the vans gassed up? Will the kids be here on time? Will camp go smoothly? Only nine more practices until we open. Nine! Can we really put in everything on time?
You’re an AHDD times 12 and you can’t help it. You kiss your wife; love on your daughters. You’re out the door. Words from a Jackson Browne song pop into your head: No matter how fast I run, I can never seem to get away from me.
Yeah, that fits.
It’s off to school. It’s 10:30 a.m. You better hope you know where your football team is.
What is it…Newton’s Law? When things go wrong, they can. Or they will. The copier isn’t working. You put the paper in and all you see is a picture of a wrench on the screen. “Call for service.” You sigh. You fret. You stew. You find another copier.
It’s 12 noon straight up. The kids and their parents are all here. You’re off to camp today for the next four-plus days – camp being THE most important part of preseason. Things must go well. The team must gel. Xs and Os must be followed down to the letter, down to the dotting of the ‘I’s and the crossing of the T’s. Much information must be crammed into adolescent heads. They must soak it up like a sponge on steroids.
Parents kiss kids goodbye. Kids, embarrassed, pull away. Getting kissed by parents before a football trip, after all, can be a bit uncool. They act aloof. Still, they smile and muster a wave. They say they’ll behave, mind their manners, listen to their coaches, all that.
Two very large buses and a van head for I-85 north – destination – Seneca, South Carolina, wherever that is. It’s in the middle of nowhere – and it’s been planned that way. Nothing but days and nights of football. Yeah, that’s it.
It’s 1 p.m. and your cell phone rings. One of the kids, it seems, forgot his equipment. Could they possibly pull over on I-85 and wait for the father to bring it to him? An executive decision, the first of a million-plus that will take place in the next three months – is made. You ask the bus driver to pull over. You wait. Your head is spinning. Exactly how many wind sprints will this kid have to run to make this up? What is a fitting punishment? It doesn’t work into your agenda, but such is life. Life is, after all, what happens when you’re making other plans.
Still, that doesn’t make things any better. You throw down your clipboard and you wait.
You just ran the Sunday night meeting. Captains were named – Jack Farrell, Connor Randall, Cam Loughery and Mo Green. You’re pleased with the selection. They’ve earned it. In a new spin, you let the seniors and the captains run the meeting. You want the players to have some control over the team, let them mature enough to handle things for themselves. Let the pride instill them, fill them, and blend onto that field come August 29th and beyond. Riverwood beckons, after all, as well as a region schedule that won’t quit. No rest for the weary, they say. Then again, exactly who are they?
It was Newton’s Law, wasn’t it? You’re in the middle of your first practice, not even the first X or O has been implanted in the young’s heads. A bee, without any particular agenda or knowledge of the upcoming season, stings sophomore Zac Scott. And stings him twice! Scott, as fate would have it, is allergic to bees.
Off he goes to find his epipen. You’ve never experienced this before, yet you are the head coach. He is, after all, your responsibility. You rush off to find Zac. He’s gone, to wherever his meds are and to whatever room he’s in.
You find him. You watch while the trainer does her thing. You’re relieved. Scott is okay. You’ve learned something. And now, the show must go on. Time waits for no one, even a football team that has a player with two bee stings.
You get back to coaching, and preaching, and teaching and motivating. You do love this line of work in spite of everything. You smile.
You put them through the two-mile run. All make it, including the coaches – Stillwell, Miller, Forrester, everybody’s getting into the act. All is smooth again – except for the fields. They are a dust bowl. It hasn’t rained up here since Carter was president. The lines are all straight – thanks to Railey and Green – but there is nothing but dirt out here. You’re blowing brown gunk out of your nose so alien they could make a movie out of it. It’s gross, sure, but it’s a part of camp. Like the flu, it invades your staff, the players. Still, you soldier on.
You give the kids a break. Let them go swimming. Let them bond. Coach Forrester slips down, bumps his head on the dock. You think he has a concussion. You’ve worried so much about the players you forgot to think about the coaches. Forrester – concussion – day-to-day. You’re even thinking in terms of injury reports already. Not a good sign.
Another day, another injury. You’re holding out Jay Curnin. He, too, got a good bump on the noggin and must sit. Injuries – from a coach or a player – isn’t anything to mess with. You don’t have to think long about implications, warnings from doctors and athletic directors, all those. He sits. It’s an easy decision. You hope many will be that easy. You laugh. You know they won’t.
It’s Tuesday. Man, what happened to Sunday and Monday? Signs of tempers are being shown. Players push and shove each other. The great Georgia Bulldog announcer – Larry Munson – refers to these as “chess matches.” Coaches intervene. Coaches actually expect this. After all, it is Tuesday. Tuesday is known as “The Wall” as far as camp is concerned. Marathoners have their wall. Why can’t football players?
You’ see good things from these kids. Very good. You see bad things from these kids. Very bad. At times you want to pat your coaches and yourself on the back. Until the next play. Then you berate, you get frustrated, you wonder. High expectations? Really? Did they just see that play? Would they understand? You blow your whistle. You tell them to line up and do it again, and for God’s sakes, get it right this time. Sure, you can get away with that on some dirt-filled field in Seneca, South Carolina. Back in Atlanta, though, there will be hell to pay. The score on the opposing side will immediately increase by six if this continues to happen. You fret. If you had more hair, you’d pull it. You take it out on your hat.
Practice goes on.
It’s the last afternoon practice. Tuesday has turned in to Wednesday. The players, when finished, will enjoy a cookout. They will perform skits. They will laugh, bond, enjoy, forget about life and August 29th and all it stands for. Let them be kids. It’s the one easy mistake coaches and parents can easily make: forgetting that they are, only 15 or 16 – prone to break out in song or a video game war or a hackey sack game or a game of cards. Or maybe a gossip session or a manic time of cell phone calls, minutes left be darned.
Taylor Hammond gets the biggest laugh. He impersonates Strength and Conditioning coach Peter Tongren. His imitation is spot-on. The players/kids/future adults appear at ease. The cookout and skit show has proven its purpose. All unite, enjoy, feast, slap backs in unison. It’s great to be a coach sometimes, isn’t it?
You enjoy the moment. After all, sometimes it isn’t.
It’s the last practice. That law again that we referred to earlier, yeah, you know the one. Connor Randall, your potential Division I football recruit, has tweaked his ankle. And it wasn’t even during a contact drill! He just rolled it, just enough to make you worry, just enough for that fence to open up inside your head, just enough for several like it to join in and take up arms. You look at your depth chart. You look at Connor’s ankle. You look at it again. You worry. Maybe you should’ve gone to med school after all. You were smart enough. Weren’t you?
You put Connor on the sideline. You send trainers and any form of medical help you can find to his side. August 29th is sitting heavy in your head. Like a cancer, it just grows, no chemo in sight.
You finish practice.
You try to make sense of it all. Yes, it was a good camp. Concussions, bee stings, lack of equipment, tweaked ankles, broken copiers and sinus problems notwithstanding, you got a lot accomplished. The kids, with not too many distractions, have been instructed, whistled at, yelled at, prompted, goaded, influenced, instructed, coached, congratulated, laughed at, and then some. How much more room is there up there in those crowded adolescent minds? Can they fit more? Will they?
You’re going back to Atlanta today, hopefully with all your kids and all their equipment. There’s an intra-squad scrimmage tomorrow. No rest for the weary. Camp was good, yeah it was. You’ll tell the reporters, if they ask, how much you got done, how well they played. It will sound so effortless when it comes out in print, so final, so A-to-Z without any hitches in the middle.
Words, summaries, what do they know? Would they understand unless they were here?
You don’t know, but you don’t have time to worry. You must pack. Load up U-Hauls. Clean up after yourself. Get the kids home in time. Get back to your family. Speaking of, your cell phone rings.
It’s your wife. You’re in charge of making dinner tonight. You must get home, get the kids situated, pick up your girls, spend time with them, do laundry, unpack and make dinner.
So many roles, so little time. So many Xs, so many Os. August 29th. Depth charts. Injury reports. Scouting reports. A scrimmage. And do you make lasagna or spaghetti? Are your girls ready for school? Do you have any more laundry detergent? Will your wife like your cooking? Will we play good tomorrow?
After all, it’s your last scrimmage. Only a few practices left before… Well, you know. You put down your cell phone and you smile.
After all, how can you not?
Dunn Neugebauer and Ryan Livezey
August, 2008
Pre-season football
It’s 6:30 a.m. Do you know where your football team is? You haven’t had your coffee, nor a chance to bond with your wife or girls, but already the questions mount. I mean, you were 7-5 last year and went to the playoffs and you’re supposed to be good this year. Still, you wonder. Will we be? Can we be?
Thoughts follow you to breakfast, nudge you while you sip your coffee, sit poised at the tip of your brain while you make small talk. The fence in your head is getting wider, opening the door for more agenda, more questions, more problems.
Get the copies to the coaches. Send Coach Railey and Green out to line the field. Work out the new offense with Coach Green. Pray to the Good Lord above nobody gets hurt.
Are the vans gassed up? Will the kids be here on time? Will camp go smoothly? Only nine more practices until we open. Nine! Can we really put in everything on time?
You’re an AHDD times 12 and you can’t help it. You kiss your wife; love on your daughters. You’re out the door. Words from a Jackson Browne song pop into your head: No matter how fast I run, I can never seem to get away from me.
Yeah, that fits.
It’s off to school. It’s 10:30 a.m. You better hope you know where your football team is.
What is it…Newton’s Law? When things go wrong, they can. Or they will. The copier isn’t working. You put the paper in and all you see is a picture of a wrench on the screen. “Call for service.” You sigh. You fret. You stew. You find another copier.
It’s 12 noon straight up. The kids and their parents are all here. You’re off to camp today for the next four-plus days – camp being THE most important part of preseason. Things must go well. The team must gel. Xs and Os must be followed down to the letter, down to the dotting of the ‘I’s and the crossing of the T’s. Much information must be crammed into adolescent heads. They must soak it up like a sponge on steroids.
Parents kiss kids goodbye. Kids, embarrassed, pull away. Getting kissed by parents before a football trip, after all, can be a bit uncool. They act aloof. Still, they smile and muster a wave. They say they’ll behave, mind their manners, listen to their coaches, all that.
Two very large buses and a van head for I-85 north – destination – Seneca, South Carolina, wherever that is. It’s in the middle of nowhere – and it’s been planned that way. Nothing but days and nights of football. Yeah, that’s it.
It’s 1 p.m. and your cell phone rings. One of the kids, it seems, forgot his equipment. Could they possibly pull over on I-85 and wait for the father to bring it to him? An executive decision, the first of a million-plus that will take place in the next three months – is made. You ask the bus driver to pull over. You wait. Your head is spinning. Exactly how many wind sprints will this kid have to run to make this up? What is a fitting punishment? It doesn’t work into your agenda, but such is life. Life is, after all, what happens when you’re making other plans.
Still, that doesn’t make things any better. You throw down your clipboard and you wait.
You just ran the Sunday night meeting. Captains were named – Jack Farrell, Connor Randall, Cam Loughery and Mo Green. You’re pleased with the selection. They’ve earned it. In a new spin, you let the seniors and the captains run the meeting. You want the players to have some control over the team, let them mature enough to handle things for themselves. Let the pride instill them, fill them, and blend onto that field come August 29th and beyond. Riverwood beckons, after all, as well as a region schedule that won’t quit. No rest for the weary, they say. Then again, exactly who are they?
It was Newton’s Law, wasn’t it? You’re in the middle of your first practice, not even the first X or O has been implanted in the young’s heads. A bee, without any particular agenda or knowledge of the upcoming season, stings sophomore Zac Scott. And stings him twice! Scott, as fate would have it, is allergic to bees.
Off he goes to find his epipen. You’ve never experienced this before, yet you are the head coach. He is, after all, your responsibility. You rush off to find Zac. He’s gone, to wherever his meds are and to whatever room he’s in.
You find him. You watch while the trainer does her thing. You’re relieved. Scott is okay. You’ve learned something. And now, the show must go on. Time waits for no one, even a football team that has a player with two bee stings.
You get back to coaching, and preaching, and teaching and motivating. You do love this line of work in spite of everything. You smile.
You put them through the two-mile run. All make it, including the coaches – Stillwell, Miller, Forrester, everybody’s getting into the act. All is smooth again – except for the fields. They are a dust bowl. It hasn’t rained up here since Carter was president. The lines are all straight – thanks to Railey and Green – but there is nothing but dirt out here. You’re blowing brown gunk out of your nose so alien they could make a movie out of it. It’s gross, sure, but it’s a part of camp. Like the flu, it invades your staff, the players. Still, you soldier on.
You give the kids a break. Let them go swimming. Let them bond. Coach Forrester slips down, bumps his head on the dock. You think he has a concussion. You’ve worried so much about the players you forgot to think about the coaches. Forrester – concussion – day-to-day. You’re even thinking in terms of injury reports already. Not a good sign.
Another day, another injury. You’re holding out Jay Curnin. He, too, got a good bump on the noggin and must sit. Injuries – from a coach or a player – isn’t anything to mess with. You don’t have to think long about implications, warnings from doctors and athletic directors, all those. He sits. It’s an easy decision. You hope many will be that easy. You laugh. You know they won’t.
It’s Tuesday. Man, what happened to Sunday and Monday? Signs of tempers are being shown. Players push and shove each other. The great Georgia Bulldog announcer – Larry Munson – refers to these as “chess matches.” Coaches intervene. Coaches actually expect this. After all, it is Tuesday. Tuesday is known as “The Wall” as far as camp is concerned. Marathoners have their wall. Why can’t football players?
You’ see good things from these kids. Very good. You see bad things from these kids. Very bad. At times you want to pat your coaches and yourself on the back. Until the next play. Then you berate, you get frustrated, you wonder. High expectations? Really? Did they just see that play? Would they understand? You blow your whistle. You tell them to line up and do it again, and for God’s sakes, get it right this time. Sure, you can get away with that on some dirt-filled field in Seneca, South Carolina. Back in Atlanta, though, there will be hell to pay. The score on the opposing side will immediately increase by six if this continues to happen. You fret. If you had more hair, you’d pull it. You take it out on your hat.
Practice goes on.
It’s the last afternoon practice. Tuesday has turned in to Wednesday. The players, when finished, will enjoy a cookout. They will perform skits. They will laugh, bond, enjoy, forget about life and August 29th and all it stands for. Let them be kids. It’s the one easy mistake coaches and parents can easily make: forgetting that they are, only 15 or 16 – prone to break out in song or a video game war or a hackey sack game or a game of cards. Or maybe a gossip session or a manic time of cell phone calls, minutes left be darned.
Taylor Hammond gets the biggest laugh. He impersonates Strength and Conditioning coach Peter Tongren. His imitation is spot-on. The players/kids/future adults appear at ease. The cookout and skit show has proven its purpose. All unite, enjoy, feast, slap backs in unison. It’s great to be a coach sometimes, isn’t it?
You enjoy the moment. After all, sometimes it isn’t.
It’s the last practice. That law again that we referred to earlier, yeah, you know the one. Connor Randall, your potential Division I football recruit, has tweaked his ankle. And it wasn’t even during a contact drill! He just rolled it, just enough to make you worry, just enough for that fence to open up inside your head, just enough for several like it to join in and take up arms. You look at your depth chart. You look at Connor’s ankle. You look at it again. You worry. Maybe you should’ve gone to med school after all. You were smart enough. Weren’t you?
You put Connor on the sideline. You send trainers and any form of medical help you can find to his side. August 29th is sitting heavy in your head. Like a cancer, it just grows, no chemo in sight.
You finish practice.
You try to make sense of it all. Yes, it was a good camp. Concussions, bee stings, lack of equipment, tweaked ankles, broken copiers and sinus problems notwithstanding, you got a lot accomplished. The kids, with not too many distractions, have been instructed, whistled at, yelled at, prompted, goaded, influenced, instructed, coached, congratulated, laughed at, and then some. How much more room is there up there in those crowded adolescent minds? Can they fit more? Will they?
You’re going back to Atlanta today, hopefully with all your kids and all their equipment. There’s an intra-squad scrimmage tomorrow. No rest for the weary. Camp was good, yeah it was. You’ll tell the reporters, if they ask, how much you got done, how well they played. It will sound so effortless when it comes out in print, so final, so A-to-Z without any hitches in the middle.
Words, summaries, what do they know? Would they understand unless they were here?
You don’t know, but you don’t have time to worry. You must pack. Load up U-Hauls. Clean up after yourself. Get the kids home in time. Get back to your family. Speaking of, your cell phone rings.
It’s your wife. You’re in charge of making dinner tonight. You must get home, get the kids situated, pick up your girls, spend time with them, do laundry, unpack and make dinner.
So many roles, so little time. So many Xs, so many Os. August 29th. Depth charts. Injury reports. Scouting reports. A scrimmage. And do you make lasagna or spaghetti? Are your girls ready for school? Do you have any more laundry detergent? Will your wife like your cooking? Will we play good tomorrow?
After all, it’s your last scrimmage. Only a few practices left before… Well, you know. You put down your cell phone and you smile.
After all, how can you not?
Dunn Neugebauer and Ryan Livezey
August, 2008
Pre-season football
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Dunn's date report - Volume 2
So she’s sitting across the table from me – we’re at Hudson Grille at Brookhaven – she’s got a bandanna strapped around her head, blue jeans on and a tight shirt. She’s versatile – she could have walked out of the movie set from “Easy Rider” or she could fit in at a sports bar. Doesn’t matter.
Her face is smooth – a zit could never even think about taking up residence on that mug.
Me, my hair looks okay but my face looks like I spent last night blocking punts. I’ve got on nice shorts and a collared HIES staff shirt, tennis shoes and nerdy socks.
We’re talking and we find out that we both attended the same tennis camp as pups; she as a 12-year old and me 15. I wouldn’t have noticed back then; all I knew was that my backhand was okay but I couldn’t hit a forehand for shit.
We’re talking some more and we find out that we both hate onions.
“I didn’t think anybody else hated onions,” she says.
And, later in the conversation: “I played rugby at Mt. Holyoke and I was a hooker.”
Man, I’m thinking, this could be my lucky night!”
“No, no, no,” she says. “A hooker is a position!”
Oh, even better!
“I mean, a position in rugby!”
Damn!
She also tried out for crew, where they told her she had to be a coxswain. All I heard was cock, so my mind took off again.
“Gee Chuck, the date started out okay, then it went downhill in a hurry.”
But I’m on a roll. She’s laughing and leaning across the table. Now, according to the IHOS (International Handbook of Studs), if a girl leans across the table, this is excellent body language and might give you some hope of at least getting to first base. So I’m telling jokes and lies and more jokes and telling her about my job at HIES and about how loved and important and respected I am at my position as Head of School and she’s talking about her job teaching at Galloway and I’m thinking, “You’re hot, you’re hot, you’re hot.” I mean, her lips are moving but that’s all I’m hearing.
Finally, she asks, “Georgia or Georgia Tech? Which do you like?”
Oh shit, fifty-fifty chance. Don’t blow it, don’t blow it!
“Er…Georgia?”
“I HATE Georgia,” she says.
“Damn, and I was doing so good with you!”
She laughed. Another fifty-fifty down the tubes.
Anyway, we pay the bill and I take her home. This, as you might have read from a previous date report, is always the hard part. So to speak.
She invites me in and we’re sitting on the couch. We’re playing with her two dogs. She’s right next to me. I’m thinking I’m gonna plant one on her so hard I’m gonna feel like my face got caught in a tackle box. Go for it, go for it.
There’s a devil on one of my shoulder. I look to the other for comfort. Oops, another devil. To do it or not to do it? That is the question. I feel inept, sort of like Kevin on the Wonder Years. I can even hear the music, “What would you do if I sang out of tune…”
Holy shit, would you concentrate!
“I have to get up early so I guess this is good night,” she says. She stands up; I stare at her butt, then stand myself.
We walk out to the garage. It’s dark. She gives me a big hug. I can’t get Joe Cocker’s voice out of my head. “Get by with a little help from my friends.”
She hugs me, then drops her head, a big negative according to the IHOS. The hug, however was good, positive, embracing.
“We’re running Sunday, right?” she says.
Cool, a future date. Damn the IHOS and everything it stands for.
I go to the car, kissless, but with my face still intact. It could have gone better but still, tomorrow, as they say, is another day.
Editor’s note: It’s always a pleasure and a severe case of tragedy reporting my cases of inept-ness in the dating scene. Maybe I should’ve held on to my ex-wife. She didn’t like me very much, but she was rich and had one helluva microwave. “Hitch your wagon to a star…” Please respond with advice or ask me politely to quit sending you this shit. Just wanted to give you some brain-dead reading before school starts.
Still single but holding my own (so to speak),
Dunn
James Dunn
Her face is smooth – a zit could never even think about taking up residence on that mug.
Me, my hair looks okay but my face looks like I spent last night blocking punts. I’ve got on nice shorts and a collared HIES staff shirt, tennis shoes and nerdy socks.
We’re talking and we find out that we both attended the same tennis camp as pups; she as a 12-year old and me 15. I wouldn’t have noticed back then; all I knew was that my backhand was okay but I couldn’t hit a forehand for shit.
We’re talking some more and we find out that we both hate onions.
“I didn’t think anybody else hated onions,” she says.
And, later in the conversation: “I played rugby at Mt. Holyoke and I was a hooker.”
Man, I’m thinking, this could be my lucky night!”
“No, no, no,” she says. “A hooker is a position!”
Oh, even better!
“I mean, a position in rugby!”
Damn!
She also tried out for crew, where they told her she had to be a coxswain. All I heard was cock, so my mind took off again.
“Gee Chuck, the date started out okay, then it went downhill in a hurry.”
But I’m on a roll. She’s laughing and leaning across the table. Now, according to the IHOS (International Handbook of Studs), if a girl leans across the table, this is excellent body language and might give you some hope of at least getting to first base. So I’m telling jokes and lies and more jokes and telling her about my job at HIES and about how loved and important and respected I am at my position as Head of School and she’s talking about her job teaching at Galloway and I’m thinking, “You’re hot, you’re hot, you’re hot.” I mean, her lips are moving but that’s all I’m hearing.
Finally, she asks, “Georgia or Georgia Tech? Which do you like?”
Oh shit, fifty-fifty chance. Don’t blow it, don’t blow it!
“Er…Georgia?”
“I HATE Georgia,” she says.
“Damn, and I was doing so good with you!”
She laughed. Another fifty-fifty down the tubes.
Anyway, we pay the bill and I take her home. This, as you might have read from a previous date report, is always the hard part. So to speak.
She invites me in and we’re sitting on the couch. We’re playing with her two dogs. She’s right next to me. I’m thinking I’m gonna plant one on her so hard I’m gonna feel like my face got caught in a tackle box. Go for it, go for it.
There’s a devil on one of my shoulder. I look to the other for comfort. Oops, another devil. To do it or not to do it? That is the question. I feel inept, sort of like Kevin on the Wonder Years. I can even hear the music, “What would you do if I sang out of tune…”
Holy shit, would you concentrate!
“I have to get up early so I guess this is good night,” she says. She stands up; I stare at her butt, then stand myself.
We walk out to the garage. It’s dark. She gives me a big hug. I can’t get Joe Cocker’s voice out of my head. “Get by with a little help from my friends.”
She hugs me, then drops her head, a big negative according to the IHOS. The hug, however was good, positive, embracing.
“We’re running Sunday, right?” she says.
Cool, a future date. Damn the IHOS and everything it stands for.
I go to the car, kissless, but with my face still intact. It could have gone better but still, tomorrow, as they say, is another day.
Editor’s note: It’s always a pleasure and a severe case of tragedy reporting my cases of inept-ness in the dating scene. Maybe I should’ve held on to my ex-wife. She didn’t like me very much, but she was rich and had one helluva microwave. “Hitch your wagon to a star…” Please respond with advice or ask me politely to quit sending you this shit. Just wanted to give you some brain-dead reading before school starts.
Still single but holding my own (so to speak),
Dunn
James Dunn
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Acers upset #1 team!
With strong play at the top of the lineup and the finishing touch at the bottom, Abby’s Acers edged out Village Park Saturday morning 3-2 in Marietta.
The win kept the Acers in playoff contention; they are in good shape to take the second-place slot pending a decisive win next Saturday at North Fulton.
It came down to the #5 doubles slot, as Mariel Cordero and Dunn Neugebauer were blown out 6-2 in the first set. But as their opponents wore down, the Acer’s duo picked it up for a 6-4, 6-4 win to clinch the match.
“I had to show off for my girlfriend Mandy “American Vision” Mullen,” Neugebauer said. “I saw her over there with her hot pink hat and her new car and I just had to win.”
Said Cordero, “I knew we’d kick colo.”
The match started in convincing fashion for our local heroes, as Andrew and Katie pulled off a 7-6, 6-3 win at No.1 to set the positive stage.
At #2, Brad “Thunderball Hendrickson and Hadley Miller won 6-3, 7-6 to give the Acers a 2-0 lead.
Things got rough in the middle of the lineup, however. Mike and Abby played hard and forced a third set, but went down at #3. At #4, Diane and Jay lost two hard-fought sets to set the stage for the final match.
The Acers didn’t have time for a celebratory luncheon, as Diane is fixing a nice roast at her house tonight while Abby is bringing a salad. “Come hungry,” Abby insisted.
Diane wasn’t available for comment as she was already in the kitchen.
Stay tuned next week for the final chapter of regular season before hopefully moving on to the playoffs. Stay tuned!!!
The win kept the Acers in playoff contention; they are in good shape to take the second-place slot pending a decisive win next Saturday at North Fulton.
It came down to the #5 doubles slot, as Mariel Cordero and Dunn Neugebauer were blown out 6-2 in the first set. But as their opponents wore down, the Acer’s duo picked it up for a 6-4, 6-4 win to clinch the match.
“I had to show off for my girlfriend Mandy “American Vision” Mullen,” Neugebauer said. “I saw her over there with her hot pink hat and her new car and I just had to win.”
Said Cordero, “I knew we’d kick colo.”
The match started in convincing fashion for our local heroes, as Andrew and Katie pulled off a 7-6, 6-3 win at No.1 to set the positive stage.
At #2, Brad “Thunderball Hendrickson and Hadley Miller won 6-3, 7-6 to give the Acers a 2-0 lead.
Things got rough in the middle of the lineup, however. Mike and Abby played hard and forced a third set, but went down at #3. At #4, Diane and Jay lost two hard-fought sets to set the stage for the final match.
The Acers didn’t have time for a celebratory luncheon, as Diane is fixing a nice roast at her house tonight while Abby is bringing a salad. “Come hungry,” Abby insisted.
Diane wasn’t available for comment as she was already in the kitchen.
Stay tuned next week for the final chapter of regular season before hopefully moving on to the playoffs. Stay tuned!!!
Friday, July 4, 2008
Meditations from the Peachtree Road Race
The real race at the Peachtree isn’t logging the 6.2 miles from start to finish. It’s finding the sacred number in the first place.
Not thinking ahead back in March when the entries came out and not qualifying due to laziness and lack of training, my idea to even run the event didn’t occur to me until the week before.
“Do you have a number?”
“No.”
“Don’t’ worry! All you have to do is go to the Expo. People are selling them all over the place.”
That was the advice I got anyway.
So off I went, checkbook in hand. Only to find many others with the same idea. They sat in the couches outside, signs declaring how many numbers they needed. I thought this was supposed to be easy. Geez, I’d scalped tickets at Wrigley Field easier than this. And I wasn’t even trying.
When in doubt, however, always go to the #1 option: telling every friend and foe alike that you need a number. It was either that or show up outside of the Lenox Marta station on race morning, twenty dollar bill stuck inside my sock and fighting off more competition.
Fortunately, a friend came through. “I think,” he said. “Come to our dinner the night before. If Andrea doesn’t show up, the number’s yours.”
So there I sat at Jo's Grill near Blackburn Park. Pasta sizzling on my plate. Praying to God above that every female who walked in wasn’t Andrea. They weren’t. The number was mine.
Now for Step 2 and Step 3 of the proverbial Peachtree Road Race, also hard parts: waking up in the morning, followed by finding a parking place. After all, 55,000 eager Atlantans are supposed to be here so it can’t be too easy.
The waking up part was easy. I never went to sleep in the first place. This could have been a disaster, though Ace Ventura was playing at 4 a.m. so it wasn’t all bad. It’s one of those movies I can always laugh at no matter how many times I’ve seen it.
So I have a number and I’ve woken up and I’ve parked – legally I think – at some up-and-coming subdivision off Wieuca Road. Now for Step 4, also equally as impossible: Meet up with a friend before the race starts.
This sounds easy, but when you’re trying to cross Peachtree Road with all the barricades, this can be tougher than Step 1. But after being routed and re-routed, after turns and U-turns, and after running practically 6.2 pre-race miles, we found our friend.
Finally, it was off to the easy part: the race itself.
The journey down Peachtree was a joy. People running in Scuba gear, people with their hair dyed red, white and blue, flags flying, bands playing, water spraying, fans cheering, some people already drinking despite the early hour. Thank God for my ADD, which let me take most of it in as me and my two friends – starting in the 40,000 block – did the journey.
I will repeat the quote I heard about the new finish at the Peachtree – “It’s a real bitch!” – and I have to say I agree. Turning off of Peachtree somewhere around Mile 6, we began mostly an uphill journey to the finish line. How the Atlanta Track Club successfully pulls this off year after year, particularly when they were told they couldn’t use Piedmont Park, is far beyond me.
But they did it. Again.
For the record, the sacred T-shirt is blue this time, with red, white, and blue coloring inside of the 10K message scrawled across the middle. On the bottom is the date. It’s cotton and it’s dry, therefore it is nice.
Now that we had our reward, it was time for yet another difficult part of the Peachtree: boarding Marta with all those stinky people - like myself. Herding in like cattle, we crowded in our car and headed back to Lenox. Keeping my nose held high and holding my breath, it wasn’t as bad as I thought.
Wasn’t as hard as getting my number, anyway.
Can’t wait till next year.
Not thinking ahead back in March when the entries came out and not qualifying due to laziness and lack of training, my idea to even run the event didn’t occur to me until the week before.
“Do you have a number?”
“No.”
“Don’t’ worry! All you have to do is go to the Expo. People are selling them all over the place.”
That was the advice I got anyway.
So off I went, checkbook in hand. Only to find many others with the same idea. They sat in the couches outside, signs declaring how many numbers they needed. I thought this was supposed to be easy. Geez, I’d scalped tickets at Wrigley Field easier than this. And I wasn’t even trying.
When in doubt, however, always go to the #1 option: telling every friend and foe alike that you need a number. It was either that or show up outside of the Lenox Marta station on race morning, twenty dollar bill stuck inside my sock and fighting off more competition.
Fortunately, a friend came through. “I think,” he said. “Come to our dinner the night before. If Andrea doesn’t show up, the number’s yours.”
So there I sat at Jo's Grill near Blackburn Park. Pasta sizzling on my plate. Praying to God above that every female who walked in wasn’t Andrea. They weren’t. The number was mine.
Now for Step 2 and Step 3 of the proverbial Peachtree Road Race, also hard parts: waking up in the morning, followed by finding a parking place. After all, 55,000 eager Atlantans are supposed to be here so it can’t be too easy.
The waking up part was easy. I never went to sleep in the first place. This could have been a disaster, though Ace Ventura was playing at 4 a.m. so it wasn’t all bad. It’s one of those movies I can always laugh at no matter how many times I’ve seen it.
So I have a number and I’ve woken up and I’ve parked – legally I think – at some up-and-coming subdivision off Wieuca Road. Now for Step 4, also equally as impossible: Meet up with a friend before the race starts.
This sounds easy, but when you’re trying to cross Peachtree Road with all the barricades, this can be tougher than Step 1. But after being routed and re-routed, after turns and U-turns, and after running practically 6.2 pre-race miles, we found our friend.
Finally, it was off to the easy part: the race itself.
The journey down Peachtree was a joy. People running in Scuba gear, people with their hair dyed red, white and blue, flags flying, bands playing, water spraying, fans cheering, some people already drinking despite the early hour. Thank God for my ADD, which let me take most of it in as me and my two friends – starting in the 40,000 block – did the journey.
I will repeat the quote I heard about the new finish at the Peachtree – “It’s a real bitch!” – and I have to say I agree. Turning off of Peachtree somewhere around Mile 6, we began mostly an uphill journey to the finish line. How the Atlanta Track Club successfully pulls this off year after year, particularly when they were told they couldn’t use Piedmont Park, is far beyond me.
But they did it. Again.
For the record, the sacred T-shirt is blue this time, with red, white, and blue coloring inside of the 10K message scrawled across the middle. On the bottom is the date. It’s cotton and it’s dry, therefore it is nice.
Now that we had our reward, it was time for yet another difficult part of the Peachtree: boarding Marta with all those stinky people - like myself. Herding in like cattle, we crowded in our car and headed back to Lenox. Keeping my nose held high and holding my breath, it wasn’t as bad as I thought.
Wasn’t as hard as getting my number, anyway.
Can’t wait till next year.
Thursday, July 3, 2008
A Better Place to Play
(1)
I first noticed the old man while on the 19th minute of a one-hour jog. Or perhaps I should say I heard him first, and my curiosity—normally a dormant thing—got the best of me.
It was mid-morning in north Georgia, and while the majority was making the world a better place, I was undergoing a “sabbatical” suggested by my boss. I wasn’t such a bad employee, it’s just that I had trouble continuing on with life while, only two weeks before they had stuck my father’s body in an incinerator and burned him. He died in pain, of cancer.
Hours after his death, while standing at the Amoco trying to decide behind ‘credit inside’ or ‘credit here’, I realized we must go on.
Somehow I wasn’t ready to. Work-wise, I didn’t, and hence, there I was, a lone figure jogging down Route 76 in Georgia on a beautiful day when the more fortunate were probably trying to decide between a three iron or a five-wood, paper or plastic, martini with or without the olive. I was running, but we’ll get to me later.
I want to tell you about the old man.
His voice was what I heard and with my labored breathing it had to be loud. I had turned onto Maple, wherever that was, and an old but piercing shriek opened up the Georgia sky. “WHAT do ya mean, safe, are you out of your &**&$# mind! Come on ump, you’re missing a good game. Jeez! That’s okay, boys, shake it off, we’ll get these %$#’s out yet.”
Looking to my right I saw a baseball park, or what used to be one anyway. Grass and weeds had taken over a once lined and chalked infield, and the outfield fence, once holding up advertisements, now competed with tree limbs and bushes even to be seen. Moving closer, I saw the old man’s shape, sitting directly behind what I guessed was once home plate, though the plate was muddy brown and the batter’s boxes probably hadn’t seen chalk since Carter was in office.
His shape was almost comical. I almost laughed. Check that, I did laugh. How could I not? What can you say about a silly old man screaming and yelling at a baseball game that didn’t exist? I moved closer, to make sure it didn’t—the game I mean—and my observations were accurate. There was no one anywhere near, no game being played, no ump, no players, no concession stands.
Just the old man, and nothing more.
His brown socks came nothing close to matching his tattered, white tennis shoes. His legs and arms were matchsticks at best, and he had on a punished-by-time blue hat with a red bill. His hair hadn’t been as effected by the years, as he still had a bushy head of blond/gray hair, and he kept taking his cap off and pushing it over to the side, as if keeping it arms and legs distance where it wouldn’t interfere with his voice. Despite the warmth, the man had chosen a jacket to wear with his shorts, and he kept tugging at the zipper, seemingly keeping out whatever cold he may have felt.
“Come on kiddo, fire it right in there. This man can’t hit. Look at his knees waggling, he’s scared. You got him boy. Sit him down.”
I stopped, something I never allow myself to do when running and my direction took me straight over to the bleachers. No, he didn’t look like he wanted company; though I didn’t think he’d notice actually. Still, something about seeing this passion-filled geezer drew me.
At about ten yards and closing he heard me. Perhaps they were between innings and his attention was wandering, I wasn’t sure. But he looked over and locked into my eyes. His hat had a “T” on the bill; it was crooked to one side, pulled over low, keeping the sun and most of the vision from the man’s eyes. He had glasses, a funny round mouth and his large nose protruded way out, making him an easy figure to draw from a profile.
His gaze stopped me—he didn’t look so friendly, though I, perhaps on an adrenaline high from my run, continued forward anyway. The old man sized me up, then returned his attention to the game. With his eyes off me, this drew me closer, faster, and I hopped up onto the end of the dilapidated, worn bleachers.
“Mind if I join you?” I managed, perhaps more confidently than I intended.
“I don’t give a rat’s ass! I’m watching the game!” the man fired back. He leaned back momentarily on what was left of the bleachers, and that wasn’t much. Perhaps sturdy in its time, the wood now sagged even from the old man’s 130 pounds or so, and the bolts and nails piecing the whole thing together had gone to rust and then some. Splinters and shards of wood occupied most of any seat you chose, though I managed to slide my thin butt in a safe spot, perhaps five feet from the old guy.
“Get a hit, Billy. Keep your eye on the ball for Christ sakes. Come on. This guy can’t pitch. Getta hit!”
I wanted to speak, but what to say? What do you say when it’s, say, the bottom of the fourth inning and you think you want Billy, whoever or wherever he is, to get a hit? Or maybe I’m for the other team? That was it. I started laughing at the thought. Would the old man brain me if I cheered for the other team? Looking over, I sized him up. No, he was thin, worn down. Or, if needed, I was a runner, I could escape. That was it.
“Come on George, throw it right by him, this guy can’t hit. Throw him the heater. This wimp will never see it,” I hollered back, glancing over at the old man. His eyes threw off sparks, beams that went through his faded glasses and locked my eyes. He recovered though, and went back to the game.
Still, I wanted more.
“George, don’t waste a curve on this guy! Throw him your fast ball. Billy can’t hit dick.
Strike him out!”
“WHAT DO YOU MEAN, Billy can’t hit dick? He’s hitting .458 for Christ sakes. He’s on pace to break the school record. Can’t hit. Jeez, you young people….”
I wondered what ‘school’ he was referring to, but I popped right back.
“Sure he’s hitting .458, but look at who he’s doing it against?” I gestured towards an empty field, a field that hadn’t hosted bats, arms or gloves in ages.
He started to speak, but he heard a crack of a bat in his world, and the man was up so fast his cap almost spilled off his head. “THATA boy, Billy. Good shot, good hit! That’ll teach him. Yeah, how about that!” The man was clapping away, smiling, pumping his little fist in the air. “What do you say to that, young boy?” he fired at me. “Right up the middle, huh?”
Not wanting to be at a loss for words, I answered. “Yeah, sure was, dang if old Billy didn’t single up the middle.”
“SINGLE? That was a double for crying out loud! Good Lord boy, what’s wrong with your eyes?” Turning back to the game, he checked the zipper on his jacket and ignored me and my passion for the visitors. And why not? After all, Tim was up now, and apparently he was a pretty good hitter himself.
I watched for a few more minutes, or maybe for half an inning in the old man’s world, before excusing myself. “Sir, it was good seeing you. I’ll see you soon. Got to finish my jog.”
“Jog on outta here for all I care. Take your team with you. A bunch of spaghetti armed wimps your bunch is. Bring a real team over here next time!”
“Perhaps I will, sir, perhaps I will.”
He fired that look at me one more time, then dismissed me with a gesture of his arm. I headed back to Maple, away from the old man. But I still heard him. All the way down Maple and before I turned onto Cascade. From the pitch of his voice, I think Tim must have driven Billy in, but you never could tell.
After all, baseball could sometimes be a funny game.
(2)
I had rented a cabin, purposefully in the middle of nowhere. It was an hour north of Atlanta and it was the same cabin my changing pack of friends and I had always rented. In high school, we came north to celebrate the prom, the baseball title, getting laid for the first time, weekend trysts or attempts thereof, or just the enjoyment of getting away.
In college, the tradition continued. We had discovered the meaning of life here and had written it on a napkin. (Stuck napkin in my pocket; washed it two days later). Had talked Phil through a painful love life. Had been talked through an 0-15 slump during postseason. Had tried marijuana for the first time (and inhaled!) and spent the night laughing and wondering exactly why.
As adults, a colleague and I had once written a marketing presentation here that was delivered to our boss and trashed in front of at least 17 people. Had practiced meditation and failed miserably. Had made the decision to leave my marketing job and become a “consultant”, whatever that was. Had made another decision not to “consult” anymore, because I wasn’t really sure what they wanted to know. Or what I knew for that matter.
This place was all about releases, physical and mental, activity, noise, camaraderie.
This only amplified my depression as I turned the key, jimmying it back and forth, and heard the echo of the opening, unaccommodating door.
It was the first time I’d ever come here alone. The walls appeared to be creaking, waiting for me to put in a CD, waiting for the sound of an opened beer, the blender or for me or my friends to start saying something stupid. I had to laugh aloud thinking of it, and it quickly reminded me of the old man. What was the difference? He sat by baseball fields. I had my cabin.
I plopped my running shoes on the floor under the end table and settled back on the living room couch. It was a two-level cabin, situated off the road far enough to be out of view of passing motorists. The nearest neighbors were walking distance, but, unlike Atlanta, my phone could ring and surrounding families couldn’t hear it. I could crank up REM and not get a phone call. Could sit on the deck and smoke a cigar and not bother anyone but myself with the smoke.
It could sleep eight, and we had tested it and added more for good measure on occasion. Steep stairs ran from the kitchen to an upstairs bedroom, a walk straight through the front door led to a living room with a fireplace and a couch, and moving further still took you to a deck that overlooked some woods.
A bedroom split off from the backside of the living room, complete with a bathroom. The furniture was old but in working order and a television set waited in the corner of the living quarters, waiting for human touch. In all my trips here, I had never supplied it. After all, our world was always more important than the days supply of murders, deaths and arsonists. News reminded me of… well, it just reminded me
The silence didn’t help things when I stretched my legs out on the couch. Dust flew up as I plopped down. Spiders darted among webs carefully constructed throughout the living room. A rug, once throwing off brilliant prisms of red, white and blue, now contained only a dirt yellow tint, mixed carefully with mud, mold and age.
The staleness and solitude of the place did nothing to pick me up, or even make me attempt a cheery attitude. I had read somewhere where life, reduced to its simplest form, was the ability to sit in a quiet room alone, and enjoy the time spent.
Like the boxer on the ropes getting punched from midsection up, I was in serious trouble.
After pacing from kitchen to bathroom to living room to upstairs to downstairs, I realized I couldn’t sit for 10 seconds, much less a few minutes. Picking up an old Sports Illustrated, I tried to occupy my mind. Something about old news just didn’t do it. Yes, the Braves did win the World Series, about four World Series’ ago. Throwing it back down, I recalled something Indiana hoops coach Bobby Knight was quoted as saying, “If rape is inevitable, why not sit back and try to enjoy it?”
Depression was inevitable. How do you enjoy it? Laughing at my misery, I realized that occupying my time on this sabbatical was going to be a challenge. After the hustle and bustle of the big city, with all minutes, hours and days tediously penciled in by me, a boss, or a subordinate, the idea of doing nothing was going to be a chore and then some. In Atlanta, I had phones, fax machines, modems and the Internet.
Here, I had the hyperactivity of a noisy, cluttered mind.
Tossing the magazine back on the table, I again thought of the old man. I could still hear him, could still see him. What had happened? Who was he? What led him to that field at that time? Was his team any good?
Shaking off the thoughts, I walked across the dusty floor, making sweaty sock prints along the way, and tried plugging in the television. It didn’t work. Finally, I lay down and slept, and dreamed of the old guy.
Yes, I would have to say that during my “sabbatical”, it was definitely the old man that sustained me.
He wasn’t there the next day. I guess the ballplayers had a day off. Maybe the field needed repairing. Could be they were on strike. Who knew what happened in his world? Still, when rounding Maple, I cruised in for a closer look at the bleachers and the field, as if expecting something.
The afternoon heat was beating on my head, but my curiosity was enough to delay my jog somewhat. Still, there was only this field, these weeds, the trash everywhere, the branches on the fence, advertisements on billboards long ago fallen down. There were even scoreboard numbers lying around under the board, the product of the good old days. No electronics here. If you scored two in the top of the first, somebody had to run find the ‘2’ in the stack of numbers and place it up there in the slot for the top half of the first. Otherwise, how would anybody know?
I jogged on.
But the next day, he was back.
And boy was he pissed.
“GOOD GOD MAN! HOW in the HELL can you make that call? He was out by a mile! Come on ump, that’s the third one today. Now you’re really pissing me off.” The man was irate, but his voice seemed—hoarser than it was two days ago—almost as if someone was doing a poor job of dubbing words into a loud man’s body.
I had timed my jog for this—making this the one hour point where, if the old man was there, I could join in the fun. Let’s see, can I take time out of my busy schedule? Think I can work in a baseball game between naps, jogs and meager attempts at filling my time? Why not?
I walked over, catching my breath while sizing up the old guy. He had on jeans this time, still wore the jacket despite the heat, and his hat was still shaking around on his head, violently reacting to the “bad call.’
Catching my air, I wandered over quietly to my own spot to cast my opinion. Plopping down in my seat, I silently watched while the man stood and shook his tiny fist in protest. If he heard me approach, he never acknowledged.
“I don’t know sir, I think he missed the tag,” I offered after realizing he wasn’t going to even consider me.
The old man’s entire body wheeled on me; he was standing and he almost jumped at me as I offered my opinion. “You again. What in the %$#$# hell do you know? You can’t see either. I don’t know why we let you folk come over here. Bunch of blind %$#;s. The man pivoted back, suddenly clutching his stomach for a second, before regaining the laser-eyed look and resuming his interest in “the game.”
Truthfully, I was a little nervous about sharing the bleachers with the old guy, but once he settled back in and Darrin (of all people!) delivered a single up the middle, I took advantage of the old man’s change of mood by leaning back comfortably in my sky box.
His eyes blazed over for a second, then he returned back to the game and let me be. There was silence for an inning or so. The old guy plopped his faded jeans back in his seat and things were quiet for a while, though I couldn’t really tell whether the game was boring or if he wasn’t feeling so well. He would grab his stomach now and again, and with each wince it seemed his breathing would skip a bit. Still, his body language told me that how he felt on this particularly today wasn’t any of my business, so I just watched.
My attention wandered with the silence, and I found myself watching an outfield chase between two blue jays and a mockingbird. The overgrown outfield conditions were being put to good use, I guessed, as they cackled loudly while the old man and I sat in the summer Georgia sun.
Finally ending the silence, I gathered up the nerve to seek information from the old “fan.”
“Who’s pitching today?” I finally managed while the teams I suppose were changing sides.
At first I thought he wasn’t going to answer. He looked at me, turned away, then looked back again. With a sigh, I returned my gaze to the field. “Bobby’s pitching, who the hell you think?” he muttered and not so willingly.
“Yeah, Bobby. Good man, that Bobby.”
Nothing.
“Uh… sir? Bobby who?”
“Jesus, how am I supposed to watch the game with you over there. Shut your pie hole! Bobby Tretlin’s pitching!”
“I thought Bobby played third?”
“Hell no, Bobby’s never even heard of third. He’s a pitcher and an outfielder for Christ sakes!”
I crossed my legs and started wringing the sweat out on the ground. Focusing back on the field, I dared to go on. “Sir, uh, who’s playing third then?”
“%$# Timmy Warlock’s at third! Anymore questions or can I watch the game?”
“May I ask one more?”
“You just did, now get the hell outta here!”
“Sorry to bother you, but who’s the best player?”
“Huh?” His eyes and even his hat tilted up at this one, as if he couldn’t believe I didn’t know. For a split second, I actually detected a peaceful expression, but he quickly replaced it with his fire. Still, when his words came out, they were softer somewhat—more quietly delivered.
“Jonathan’s the best player,” he said. “Best glove, best arm, best bat. Jonathan’s the man. Yes sir.” He had tailed off at the end of the sentence, almost talking to somebody else. His face even seemed to regain some of its color.
Figuring this as good a stopping point as any, I left the old man alone. I had my names to investigate, he had his ball game to watch. “Have a great day, sir,” I offered politely as I slid off the bleachers, carefully avoiding splinters, and started away. “See you soon.” Pivoting off the bleachers onto the ground, I glanced back over my shoulder at the old guy while walking away.
He didn’t respond, just tilted his head ever so slightly at me. Going to the bill of his hat, he took it off, stroked his hair, put the cap back on, and returned to his game.
(3)
The locals didn’t have any information for me—none that mattered anyway. He was simply the crazy old man. “Every town has one of them,” a husky man at a gas station told me. “That old coot has been sitting there for years, yelling and carrying on. No one even pays attention to him anymore.”
A waitress was even less helpful. “What do you want to know about him for? You’re not from around here are you?”
“I think he got beat over the head so much when he was young, his brain just popped,” my nearest neighbor said. Her husband agreed. “I kinda stay clear of the old guy, myself.”
Flustered, I vowed to keep digging. Though at first it was because I had no life, it was now my mission. I had to laugh at the thought of this mission, but still, my curiosity was piqued. Climbing in my two-door, Chevy truck, I recalled what my teacher used to tell me years ago: When in doubt, go to the library. So I did.
I found it, without much trouble. It wasn’t much, just a one story, brick building just on the other side of town. Still, it was easy to find—a beauty of small places. And it proved fruitful.
It was well kept—shrubbery out front, a freshly painted sign, and the windows were being cleaned even as I drove up. Pulling into one of the spaces, I tried to unwrinkle my T-shirt somewhat and not appear as if I’d just crawled out of bed. No luck, but who cared? Somehow I just couldn’t picture too many people breathing right now that really cared what I looked like.
Inside, the help seemed friendly—a cheery young lady welcomed me and asked if there was anything she could do, just holler. Not wanting to intrude and being a bit shy around attractive women, I first walked past, but then thought better of it. “Maybe you could help me…” I began.
“Sure, ask.” She was probably in her 30’s, brown hair tied in a bun, glasses slipped comfortably over her nose, and she was dressed professionally—nice dress, polished shoes, the works. Her eyes were blue, inquisitive, her face didn’t appear as if a zit would ever have dared to rest there and it was evident she’d spent time outside of this place, judging from her tan. When she stood, her slim build made me guess she exercised somehow and she moved quickly from her seat to the end of her cubicle.
In layman’s terms, she was a babe, but I reminded myself of my quest and quickly silenced the devils perched on both my left and right shoulder blades.
“Well,” I’m not from around here,” I started again. Her laughter cut me off.
“Sorry,” the instant someone new comes in here, the whole town knows about it. Where you from?”
“Atlanta,” I brushed my hand at this, not wanting to discuss me. Still, she seemed genuinely interested—maybe not so much in me but a good listener out of habit.
“I was concerned about the old man at the….” Her laughter told me she knew who I was talking about.
“You were wondering about old George at the baseball field,” she finished. My opening eyes told her she’d nailed it, and I sat in silence waiting for her to continue. She reached across the desk and grabbed me by my hand. “Come. You need to talk to our head librarian, Mrs. Stewart.”
“Mrs. Stewart?”
“Yeah, she’s my mother. She can tell you everything you want to know. Be careful, though, she tends to run on a bit.”
She exited her desk and led me back through two narrow shelves of books—fiction - Ra-Ro, the sign announced. At the end of the aisle, a door faced us, and she stopped on the outside and pointed to the door. “Straight through, there’s her office.”
“His name is George Leonard,” Theresa Stewart began. She was probably late 60’s, early 70’s, hair matching her daughters save the color—a before/after picture if you will. She sat before her desk, pictures flanked her on all sides—certificates, photos of a man pulling in a huge fish, mother at daughter’s graduation, high school and college, a family photo, and a photo of a ground breaking, possibly of the building in which we now sat.
I had taken a seat in front of her desk, reminding of the days of getting sent to the principle’s office. I could have sworn it WAS the same chair back as my old school, one that made it impossible for me to sink down in my seat. It held me upright, made me face her front and center.
“What’s his story?” I began as I again refused her gesture towards the coffeepot that sat behind her. She tilted her head upward, sort of chuckled to no one in particular as she collected her thoughts and prepared to face me again. Her face was easy to look at, probably had knocked a few dead in her time, making it easy to see where her daughter got her looks.
“George has been sitting at that field for over ten years now. Ten years,” she said again for effect. “His wife left him, he’s got no family to speak of and his whole life is out there in those bleachers.”
I had given her my other names from the day before’s lineup—she knew them both. She stopped me while trying to recall one of the last names—as if the provided information was more than enough.
“They were all on that team—a good team, possible state contenders if you believe the papers.
“What happened?” I asked, shifting my leg up over my knee. It was a sitting position preferred by women and one that had actually gotten me my butt kicked in high school. Still, I could never bend my legs that much.
“His son, Jonathan, died. That’s what happened.” She shook her head, trying to clear the memories.
“Let me guess. Car accident. Killed by a drunk driver. Right?”
“No,” she looked up again. “Well, you’re half right. It was a car accident, though I’m afraid he was the drunk driver. I don’t know, I don’t know for sure. Families keep that sort of thing secret you know. Still, it is a small town….” She took a deep breath and continued. “They had just won the region championship - I believe that’s what it was. Anyway, apparently the team had a little celebration. Jonathan was on his way home from the North Carolina border—it’s only about twenty miles north you know. He rounded a curve too fast.” She snapped her fingers, signifying the quickness of his death. “Just like that.”
“God I hate to hear stuff like that.” I offered sincerely.
“Boy, don’t we all,” she agreed. “You know, death is a tough thing no matter where you are. But to me, it seems to be intensified in a small town. I don’t know, everybody knows so much about each other—everybody IS a part of each other. Somebody young like that goes, the whole town’s in shock. For months, years even.”
I paused, uncrossed my legs. “So the old man never recovered.”
“You could say that,” she nodded, looking at her desk for comfort. “He still goes out there every spring and summer. Still cheers the team on. Same names, same team, same tournament coming up. He never let it go.”
“Poor guy.”
“Yes, people tried to help him at first. But he was a stubborn old guy before the accident. Now…he’s ten times worse. Still, he doesn’t bother a soul, and he’s got more passion than most sane people I know. You gotta hand him that.”
I left without further interrupted her day. She assured me she wasn’t busy. Since I wasn’t either, I looked for her daughter on the way out. She was going through files while talking on the phone.
Jesus wept.
(4)
I found the tools in the shed of my cabin, though I didn’t need many. In fact, a lawn mower, some clippers and a bunch of trash bags would do just fine. I had come out to the garage right after awakening, almost on autopilot. I had spotted the mower across the spider webs and dust balls. Straddling boxes, discarded furniture and more webs, I spotted a gas can right next to it. With enough gas luckily in it, I filled the tank and started the mower. Oddly enough, it perked to life on the third try, though the original sound told me it wasn’t too happy about it.
Loading the truck, I made the half-mile drive to the ball field. Pulling into the graveled “parking lot” this marked the first time of my stay when I was glad the old man wasn’t there. Guess it would be hard to mow grass in the middle of the third inning. I laughed to myself picturing it. Exactly how mad would the guy get? Even pictured him and his bird legs chasing me through the outfield, around the bases, up through the bleachers and out into the parking lot, hitting me with his game program, or Pepsi cups, or whatever he could find for ammo.
But no, today was another off day for the team. Perhaps they had a road game, I wasn’t really sure.
The sun announced its presence with authority, but I barely noticed. Instead, it was Wendy’s sacks, discarded beer bottles, plastic sacks, brown bags, bottle caps, and good Lord the rocks! A ball hit on this infield would carom away as if on a bumper pool table.
Still, I used an abandoned cardboard box that had just enough weight on it to use to drag the infield with. It was archaic, but it got the baby rocks off and pulled some more to the surface. From there, it was me testing out my own rusty arm, firing rocks into the woods, aiming for trees, laughing at myself and my body for being so out of shape. It was work, but it was fun. After all, when's the last time a working man when out in his backyard to fire rocks at trees?
So the next day I came back and I worked some more. The following day, ditto. It was the next day when my "work" was interrupted.
Apparently, there was a game going on. The old man was there but I still figured I could run out and drag the infield between innings. Right? Perhaps not.
“Get your #@$% off the field sonny! We’re trying to play a game here!” The old man’s voice was a direct opposite of his appearance. I would’ve sworn there was no way a bellow of that pitch could have come from a skinny old man with chicken legs and a jacket pulled up around his throat.
But it did. Boy did it ever.
I wasn't going to leave, though, so I waited. I waited in the “dugout,” not really sure how to proceed. Cleaning up while waiting, it was the old man who gave me my cue. “Now you can drag the &%$# infield. The inning’s over. Hurry up, would you?”
I laughed at the thought of it. An old man sitting, screaming at an abandon field. A younger man running out across it all with a cardboard box. What’s going on here anyway?
Yes, I guess you could say that it was official: an insane man had become my insanity - he and his field and his passions. I laughed constantly in the days that followed, not at myself, but from reactions I got from the locals. Heads shook, windows rolled down, laughter traveled across my infield and reached my ears. “Must be a relative,” I heard one of them say.
Still, to their credit, they never once got out of their car and offered to kick my ass. I have to give them credit for that. Growing up in a small town, I found it quite unusual not to be goaded, or to have my manhood questioned, or my sanity.
They just rolled their windows back up and kept moving. Hell, they should thank me. I gave them something to talk about while I was there.
Through it all, I worked. The grass was now mowed, though I’m sure the motor is now shot due to shooting out all the rocks. My cardboard box was replaced and reinforced by three more I had purchased at the local hardware store. No, I won’t even go into the looks the man gave me when he sold them to me. For a second, I didn’t even think he was going to accept my cash. He did, though, but not before rolling his eyes and giving me this look; this look that told me who I should realize how stupid I am.
Whatever. Silly humans.
It was about a week later when it happened. I myself had declared this a day off, the old man and the doubleheader be damned. With blisters on my hands, a sore arm from all the rock throwing, and needing a general break from my four-to-eight hour days on the field, my schedule for today was a jog and a lot of sleep - nothing more.
I rounded the corner, the same corner I had first noticed the old man a couple weeks earlier. This time it wasn’t the man or his voice that captured my attention. It was the flashing lights of the ambulance. It was the sound of the gurney clanging out of the back of the truck. It was the urgent voices of the medics. It was the old man being placed on the gurney, being loaded carefully. He looked… horrible, even thinner if possible. His face was bone thin, his hair was matted and everywhere, his eyes were closed. But I think it was his mouth that got me - that closed mouth with no sound coming out. It was so depressingly silent, so scary, so threatening.
They loaded him on the back and they carted him off, leaving me standing, gaping, at an empty baseball field with no spectators.
(5)
The old man was terminally ill. Cancer. Spreading. Too far gone. It had started in the colon, but it had quickly attached itself to the rest of the body. In fact, the liver was the next victim and after that…
I guess you could say my first visit to see the old guy wasn't exactly met with open arms. No, instead he turned and spit in a cup and actually turned up the television. Still, I could be stubborn too, so I didn't leave. There he sat in pajamas, his pillow filled with his flying hair, his mouth open, ready to accept the next syllable from the newsman before he'd go into a tirade.
I stood in running shorts; eventually I sat, invitations be damned.
Finally, he glanced at me again and, having no choice, he accepted my presence. "Why are you here?"
Staring at my running shoes as if for answers, I started to speak, then stopped. After all, why was I here? "Don't you have anything better to do than pity some dying old fart? You trying to clear your conscience about something? Is that what it is? What the hell do you want? Don't you have anything better to do with yourself than hang around me and drag the infields at baseball games for Christ sakes?"
I looked him dead in the eye; he expected me to turn away, but I didn't. "You know, sir, I've been doing something very important this past week or so."
"You haven't done #$@. That's just what's wrong with kids these days, they think they're so #@# important. What the hell have you done?"
"I've been giving your son a better place to play, that's what I've done."
The man turned and his mouth opened—but nothing came out. Opened again, nothing. He dropped his gaze, turned back to the field, lowered his head. Then the old man did something so unexpected my mouth dropped open as well. He began to cry. Loud. Unashamedly.
I started to close the distance, then thought better of it. Instead I sat, then gazed back out at the field, trying to imagine those days when his son, Jonathan was king and papa was the most proud.
He lifted his head minutes later, recovering as quickly as his pride would let him. Slowly, he lifted his head and peered out, collecting his thoughts, sorting his memories. He never looked over at me, but when he began talking, I had to move closer just to hear him. His voice was … different somehow… without the edge of tough years, without the tone of power, without much of anything but—I guess peace would be the word, something I hadn’t come to expect from the guy.
“God, he had an arm,” he said. “Run, catch, throw, hit, you name it. Speed, jeez he could get down that line. A sacrifice bunt was a double he was so damn fast. Saw him strike out 16 in a seven inning game. Two homers off of Santos over in Rabun, a no-hitter in the region finals one year. Grades? Hell he made A’s, maybe a couple of B’s. Had friends coming and going always. Not just because of his talents. Hell, he was a nice kid.” It almost sounded as if he was pleading for someone to believe him, to bring him back. “Never bothered a soul. Never bragged. Just loved to run and jump and play. Would somebody please tell me what’s wrong with that? Wh…” He couldn’t finish.
At first, I didn’t even consider saying anything. The man needed his words, needed this time. But when he dropped his head again and tears flowed out, my body moved over there before my mind could stop me. I stood, uncomfortably at first, behind him and his chair. And I did the only thing that a person can do in a situation like this. My left hand reached out and touched the man on the shoulder, a reassuring gesture. Not a hard grip, but firm enough to let him know that he was being held, that some people really did understand, some people really could feel some of his pain, though perhaps not take it all away.
He felt it… he really did. I saw the goose bumps run up and down his arms, could literally feel his hair prick up somewhat. He stiffened at my touch, slowly brought his head up—didn’t say a word.
“Bless you George,” I said. “Bless you.” I put my other hand on his other shoulder, gave him a firm squeeze, then walked out the door.
(6)
That was our last conversation, though I did see him one last time before he moved off to watch his son play on greener fields, bigger stadiums, and in front of more fans. He wasn’t well and he was in great pain, but he was still happy.
“The bases are loaded for Christ sakes! Don’t %$^ bother me now. Jonathan’s up. Aren’t you people watching?”
His eyes were closed, his jaws were clenching in pain, his hands were on his stomach, but he was announcing that game as if by doing so, his voice or what he was seeing could somehow make it all go away.
I had walked in – the nurses at the desk just nodded me through. What did they care if I wanted to see some crazy old man? Nobody else had bothered to give him a visit, let the man have a visitor.
“Look for the CURVE BALL, Jonathan, the CURVE BALL. He’d be an idiot to throw you a fast one. Come on, use your head sonny. Use your noggin’.”
Me and my McDonalds sack plopped down in the chair, watched the old man, listened to the game. The way he was calling it, and grimacing, and calling it some more, heck I was interested in how it would come out.
“MAN it doesn’t get any better than this. Bases juiced, two outs, down by a run, bottom of the last inning. It’s enough to make an old man older, I tell ya’. OLDER!”
He grabbed his gut again after yelling older, pressed his bony hands almost into his innards.
I was on the edge of my seat, just waiting for his call. Surely Jonathan would come through for the old man, right? Surely there was a God.
“What’s the count?” I asked.
“QUIET! It’s 2-1, keep up. Watch the game!”
He snapped at me so quickly I wanted to watch it; really I did.
A nurse peered in, wondering if the old man had lost it again or, maybe just maybe, she wanted to know what the score was, too. I put my fingers to my lips, perhaps overstepping my bounds in telling her to keep quiet in her own habitat. So what? You heard the man. The bases were juiced. Two-one count, bottom of the last inning. And Jonathan was up for Christ sakes!
She winked at me, then looked at George sadly. I found myself closing my eyes, not wishing to feel his pain, but wanting, oh so wanting Jonathan to deliver. I, too, was picturing him out on that field, that clean field minus all the debris – minus all those beer cans, minus all those Wendy’s sacks and bottle caps, and 8 X 11 school papers and faded, torn crap that I didn’t even know what it was. On that field with the base paths wiped down, the grass trimmed just so in the infield, a little looser in the outfield, the batter’s box smoothed out just so.
There he was. Jonathan up. A beautiful spring day. The locals not giving a good damn about anything. Nothing, that is, except Jonathan delivering, somehow taking this pitch down the pipe and tattooing it over the wall. A mob at home plate. The “crowd” on its feet. The whole world right, at least for a day.
“HEEEEEY!” My eyes opened as George bounced up, practically bouncing to his feet in reaction.
“Go ball! GO BALL! GO! GO!”
“Home run?” I asked.
“HELL no, it’s off the wall.” George didn’t even look at me. Tears were running down his face. He lay back down in pain but his eyes were still open, his little fists pumping in the air. One run, come on, hurry, two runs! Hurry damn it. Beat the throw, beat the throw!”
I closed my eyes to see the throw. Saw the leftfielder play the carom perfectly off the wall, turn with his hat flying off and throwing it for all he was worth to the cut off man. The shortstop, the stated cut off man, taking the throw and humming that pill through the Georgia sky, the runner hauling his butt as if a propeller was inside it. Running, running, the ball carrying, the catching waiting, waiting, the umpire with his mask off. WAITING.
“He’s SAFE!” I almost swore I saw it exactly as George called it. The runner sliding in, Jonathan just standing on second watching the whole thing, the ump leaning forward, the dust flying up, the crowd leaning in, most lining the fences.
“He’s safe! He’s safe! He’s safe!”
George’s pain got the best of him here. He curled up in the fetal position, tears rolled down his face, he let out a scream. It was half happiness, half pain. Unfortunately, it sounded mostly like pain.
Still, I noticed a smile on that face underneath the tears. An almost peaceful look behind the expression; a man who could die while he was still on top of the world, A man who just watched his boy double in three to win the game in the county championship; a man who could swear that everything would work on just fine as long as you did the right thing, paid your taxes, made good decisions and kept your nose clean.
Yes, George Leonard was a man who could die in peace, pain be damned.
And that’s exactly what he did.
The nurse and I were both silent. We were both riled up from the game; both so happy for Jonathan, and George and all the happiness in town that day. To see him do that and then just… die. Well, it was … almost paradoxical to see such happiness and glee and then…death.
She walked over, slowly, lifted the sheet above his eyes. She looked at me. Walked over. Patted me on the arm.
“Bless you, too, sonny.”
Then she walked out.
(7)
It was September the 15th the day he died, for those of you scoring at home. At 2:15 in the afternoon, right there in front of me, me with my unopened Big Mac and my soft drink. Right in front of the nurse and her cute little hat. The local paper ran the smallest of blurbs, only a paragraph. Newspapers often can fuel my anger, and when I saw that man’s life reduced to a paragraph well hidden on page 15D of a small paper, I couldn’t help but get a little hot. What the hell was on the first three sections, and the first 14 sections of D? Page 15D. One paragraph.
But still I smiled. Because the best news rarely does get in newspapers, nor do the best people. He didn’t want news or deadlines, the results of meetings somewhere in rooms with round tables and coffee served and minutes kept. He didn’t want his picture, didn’t want conversation.
He loved the game. He enjoyed the smell of the grass. The crack of the bat. The sound of the ball hitting leather, the whip throw to second, the pivot and the snap throw to first, the look back at the ump. He enjoyed grabbing his kid by the hat and giving him a quick pat on the back. Just a whack on the back. A day at the ball field. One more bag of popcorn. Come on, just one more inning. What’s wrong with that? Could anyone tell me?
I threw the paper aside. Thoughts fought for priority in my head. None of them won out. Confused, I sat back down, then got up again. Had no idea what I was going to do, no idea how to pay tribute.
In the end, I drove north. It even reminded me of that first day jogging, the first day I saw the man. I parked my car on Route 176, right there by this old run, down, dilapidated ball field. The grass had popped back up and with a passion. Tree limbs were again over the outfield fences. Candy wrappers, beer cans and assorted results of nights out were gathered everywhere.
I didn’t walk out on the field as I had intended. Instead, I sat in the bleachers, right in the middle. Who knows, I may have seen some kind of game myself, probably spoke out loud, probably had people wondering about me as they drove past. But this I remember, and if you choose not to believe me, most would tell you that’s probably a good thing. In fact, pat yourself on the back if you don’t. After all, it means you’re sane.
Me, I looked up, and dang if the sun didn’t peek its way between two clouds, not a full shot, but a cameo, a teaser shot if you will. No, I don’t consider myself vain, but somehow I knew that peak was mine, those rays and the gentle wind that blew through my hair was for me and for me only.
The wind and sun brought out the goose bumps, and it was while peering back out at the field when I heard it. Whether it came from inside of me, from the sun or wind, or if from my imagination, I don’t know. I don’t care. I only know and heard this:
“Son, if you’re feeling sad right now, then you’re missing the whole point.” That was the voice, that was what I heard and that was what I chose to act on. It sounded sort of like the old guy, though in a more muffled, far away voice. My hair stood up, a car passing by would have laughed at the young guy sitting fully erect on a field in the middle of nowhere.
I laughed. So hard I cried. And I sat staring out at that field. How long? Not a clue. But eventually I got up, and instead of walking out to keep the field in good shape, I started slowly back to my car. The field had its day and they were good ones. Change happens. New fields are being built somewhere. Future stars are off somewhere learning the fundamentals.
I stopped at the car and looked out again. Gazed back at the sun. The old man and Jonathan would be just fine. They always would be. The field in front of me needed no more attention.
After all, my two friends had found a better place to play.
I first noticed the old man while on the 19th minute of a one-hour jog. Or perhaps I should say I heard him first, and my curiosity—normally a dormant thing—got the best of me.
It was mid-morning in north Georgia, and while the majority was making the world a better place, I was undergoing a “sabbatical” suggested by my boss. I wasn’t such a bad employee, it’s just that I had trouble continuing on with life while, only two weeks before they had stuck my father’s body in an incinerator and burned him. He died in pain, of cancer.
Hours after his death, while standing at the Amoco trying to decide behind ‘credit inside’ or ‘credit here’, I realized we must go on.
Somehow I wasn’t ready to. Work-wise, I didn’t, and hence, there I was, a lone figure jogging down Route 76 in Georgia on a beautiful day when the more fortunate were probably trying to decide between a three iron or a five-wood, paper or plastic, martini with or without the olive. I was running, but we’ll get to me later.
I want to tell you about the old man.
His voice was what I heard and with my labored breathing it had to be loud. I had turned onto Maple, wherever that was, and an old but piercing shriek opened up the Georgia sky. “WHAT do ya mean, safe, are you out of your &**&$# mind! Come on ump, you’re missing a good game. Jeez! That’s okay, boys, shake it off, we’ll get these %$#’s out yet.”
Looking to my right I saw a baseball park, or what used to be one anyway. Grass and weeds had taken over a once lined and chalked infield, and the outfield fence, once holding up advertisements, now competed with tree limbs and bushes even to be seen. Moving closer, I saw the old man’s shape, sitting directly behind what I guessed was once home plate, though the plate was muddy brown and the batter’s boxes probably hadn’t seen chalk since Carter was in office.
His shape was almost comical. I almost laughed. Check that, I did laugh. How could I not? What can you say about a silly old man screaming and yelling at a baseball game that didn’t exist? I moved closer, to make sure it didn’t—the game I mean—and my observations were accurate. There was no one anywhere near, no game being played, no ump, no players, no concession stands.
Just the old man, and nothing more.
His brown socks came nothing close to matching his tattered, white tennis shoes. His legs and arms were matchsticks at best, and he had on a punished-by-time blue hat with a red bill. His hair hadn’t been as effected by the years, as he still had a bushy head of blond/gray hair, and he kept taking his cap off and pushing it over to the side, as if keeping it arms and legs distance where it wouldn’t interfere with his voice. Despite the warmth, the man had chosen a jacket to wear with his shorts, and he kept tugging at the zipper, seemingly keeping out whatever cold he may have felt.
“Come on kiddo, fire it right in there. This man can’t hit. Look at his knees waggling, he’s scared. You got him boy. Sit him down.”
I stopped, something I never allow myself to do when running and my direction took me straight over to the bleachers. No, he didn’t look like he wanted company; though I didn’t think he’d notice actually. Still, something about seeing this passion-filled geezer drew me.
At about ten yards and closing he heard me. Perhaps they were between innings and his attention was wandering, I wasn’t sure. But he looked over and locked into my eyes. His hat had a “T” on the bill; it was crooked to one side, pulled over low, keeping the sun and most of the vision from the man’s eyes. He had glasses, a funny round mouth and his large nose protruded way out, making him an easy figure to draw from a profile.
His gaze stopped me—he didn’t look so friendly, though I, perhaps on an adrenaline high from my run, continued forward anyway. The old man sized me up, then returned his attention to the game. With his eyes off me, this drew me closer, faster, and I hopped up onto the end of the dilapidated, worn bleachers.
“Mind if I join you?” I managed, perhaps more confidently than I intended.
“I don’t give a rat’s ass! I’m watching the game!” the man fired back. He leaned back momentarily on what was left of the bleachers, and that wasn’t much. Perhaps sturdy in its time, the wood now sagged even from the old man’s 130 pounds or so, and the bolts and nails piecing the whole thing together had gone to rust and then some. Splinters and shards of wood occupied most of any seat you chose, though I managed to slide my thin butt in a safe spot, perhaps five feet from the old guy.
“Get a hit, Billy. Keep your eye on the ball for Christ sakes. Come on. This guy can’t pitch. Getta hit!”
I wanted to speak, but what to say? What do you say when it’s, say, the bottom of the fourth inning and you think you want Billy, whoever or wherever he is, to get a hit? Or maybe I’m for the other team? That was it. I started laughing at the thought. Would the old man brain me if I cheered for the other team? Looking over, I sized him up. No, he was thin, worn down. Or, if needed, I was a runner, I could escape. That was it.
“Come on George, throw it right by him, this guy can’t hit. Throw him the heater. This wimp will never see it,” I hollered back, glancing over at the old man. His eyes threw off sparks, beams that went through his faded glasses and locked my eyes. He recovered though, and went back to the game.
Still, I wanted more.
“George, don’t waste a curve on this guy! Throw him your fast ball. Billy can’t hit dick.
Strike him out!”
“WHAT DO YOU MEAN, Billy can’t hit dick? He’s hitting .458 for Christ sakes. He’s on pace to break the school record. Can’t hit. Jeez, you young people….”
I wondered what ‘school’ he was referring to, but I popped right back.
“Sure he’s hitting .458, but look at who he’s doing it against?” I gestured towards an empty field, a field that hadn’t hosted bats, arms or gloves in ages.
He started to speak, but he heard a crack of a bat in his world, and the man was up so fast his cap almost spilled off his head. “THATA boy, Billy. Good shot, good hit! That’ll teach him. Yeah, how about that!” The man was clapping away, smiling, pumping his little fist in the air. “What do you say to that, young boy?” he fired at me. “Right up the middle, huh?”
Not wanting to be at a loss for words, I answered. “Yeah, sure was, dang if old Billy didn’t single up the middle.”
“SINGLE? That was a double for crying out loud! Good Lord boy, what’s wrong with your eyes?” Turning back to the game, he checked the zipper on his jacket and ignored me and my passion for the visitors. And why not? After all, Tim was up now, and apparently he was a pretty good hitter himself.
I watched for a few more minutes, or maybe for half an inning in the old man’s world, before excusing myself. “Sir, it was good seeing you. I’ll see you soon. Got to finish my jog.”
“Jog on outta here for all I care. Take your team with you. A bunch of spaghetti armed wimps your bunch is. Bring a real team over here next time!”
“Perhaps I will, sir, perhaps I will.”
He fired that look at me one more time, then dismissed me with a gesture of his arm. I headed back to Maple, away from the old man. But I still heard him. All the way down Maple and before I turned onto Cascade. From the pitch of his voice, I think Tim must have driven Billy in, but you never could tell.
After all, baseball could sometimes be a funny game.
(2)
I had rented a cabin, purposefully in the middle of nowhere. It was an hour north of Atlanta and it was the same cabin my changing pack of friends and I had always rented. In high school, we came north to celebrate the prom, the baseball title, getting laid for the first time, weekend trysts or attempts thereof, or just the enjoyment of getting away.
In college, the tradition continued. We had discovered the meaning of life here and had written it on a napkin. (Stuck napkin in my pocket; washed it two days later). Had talked Phil through a painful love life. Had been talked through an 0-15 slump during postseason. Had tried marijuana for the first time (and inhaled!) and spent the night laughing and wondering exactly why.
As adults, a colleague and I had once written a marketing presentation here that was delivered to our boss and trashed in front of at least 17 people. Had practiced meditation and failed miserably. Had made the decision to leave my marketing job and become a “consultant”, whatever that was. Had made another decision not to “consult” anymore, because I wasn’t really sure what they wanted to know. Or what I knew for that matter.
This place was all about releases, physical and mental, activity, noise, camaraderie.
This only amplified my depression as I turned the key, jimmying it back and forth, and heard the echo of the opening, unaccommodating door.
It was the first time I’d ever come here alone. The walls appeared to be creaking, waiting for me to put in a CD, waiting for the sound of an opened beer, the blender or for me or my friends to start saying something stupid. I had to laugh aloud thinking of it, and it quickly reminded me of the old man. What was the difference? He sat by baseball fields. I had my cabin.
I plopped my running shoes on the floor under the end table and settled back on the living room couch. It was a two-level cabin, situated off the road far enough to be out of view of passing motorists. The nearest neighbors were walking distance, but, unlike Atlanta, my phone could ring and surrounding families couldn’t hear it. I could crank up REM and not get a phone call. Could sit on the deck and smoke a cigar and not bother anyone but myself with the smoke.
It could sleep eight, and we had tested it and added more for good measure on occasion. Steep stairs ran from the kitchen to an upstairs bedroom, a walk straight through the front door led to a living room with a fireplace and a couch, and moving further still took you to a deck that overlooked some woods.
A bedroom split off from the backside of the living room, complete with a bathroom. The furniture was old but in working order and a television set waited in the corner of the living quarters, waiting for human touch. In all my trips here, I had never supplied it. After all, our world was always more important than the days supply of murders, deaths and arsonists. News reminded me of… well, it just reminded me
The silence didn’t help things when I stretched my legs out on the couch. Dust flew up as I plopped down. Spiders darted among webs carefully constructed throughout the living room. A rug, once throwing off brilliant prisms of red, white and blue, now contained only a dirt yellow tint, mixed carefully with mud, mold and age.
The staleness and solitude of the place did nothing to pick me up, or even make me attempt a cheery attitude. I had read somewhere where life, reduced to its simplest form, was the ability to sit in a quiet room alone, and enjoy the time spent.
Like the boxer on the ropes getting punched from midsection up, I was in serious trouble.
After pacing from kitchen to bathroom to living room to upstairs to downstairs, I realized I couldn’t sit for 10 seconds, much less a few minutes. Picking up an old Sports Illustrated, I tried to occupy my mind. Something about old news just didn’t do it. Yes, the Braves did win the World Series, about four World Series’ ago. Throwing it back down, I recalled something Indiana hoops coach Bobby Knight was quoted as saying, “If rape is inevitable, why not sit back and try to enjoy it?”
Depression was inevitable. How do you enjoy it? Laughing at my misery, I realized that occupying my time on this sabbatical was going to be a challenge. After the hustle and bustle of the big city, with all minutes, hours and days tediously penciled in by me, a boss, or a subordinate, the idea of doing nothing was going to be a chore and then some. In Atlanta, I had phones, fax machines, modems and the Internet.
Here, I had the hyperactivity of a noisy, cluttered mind.
Tossing the magazine back on the table, I again thought of the old man. I could still hear him, could still see him. What had happened? Who was he? What led him to that field at that time? Was his team any good?
Shaking off the thoughts, I walked across the dusty floor, making sweaty sock prints along the way, and tried plugging in the television. It didn’t work. Finally, I lay down and slept, and dreamed of the old guy.
Yes, I would have to say that during my “sabbatical”, it was definitely the old man that sustained me.
He wasn’t there the next day. I guess the ballplayers had a day off. Maybe the field needed repairing. Could be they were on strike. Who knew what happened in his world? Still, when rounding Maple, I cruised in for a closer look at the bleachers and the field, as if expecting something.
The afternoon heat was beating on my head, but my curiosity was enough to delay my jog somewhat. Still, there was only this field, these weeds, the trash everywhere, the branches on the fence, advertisements on billboards long ago fallen down. There were even scoreboard numbers lying around under the board, the product of the good old days. No electronics here. If you scored two in the top of the first, somebody had to run find the ‘2’ in the stack of numbers and place it up there in the slot for the top half of the first. Otherwise, how would anybody know?
I jogged on.
But the next day, he was back.
And boy was he pissed.
“GOOD GOD MAN! HOW in the HELL can you make that call? He was out by a mile! Come on ump, that’s the third one today. Now you’re really pissing me off.” The man was irate, but his voice seemed—hoarser than it was two days ago—almost as if someone was doing a poor job of dubbing words into a loud man’s body.
I had timed my jog for this—making this the one hour point where, if the old man was there, I could join in the fun. Let’s see, can I take time out of my busy schedule? Think I can work in a baseball game between naps, jogs and meager attempts at filling my time? Why not?
I walked over, catching my breath while sizing up the old guy. He had on jeans this time, still wore the jacket despite the heat, and his hat was still shaking around on his head, violently reacting to the “bad call.’
Catching my air, I wandered over quietly to my own spot to cast my opinion. Plopping down in my seat, I silently watched while the man stood and shook his tiny fist in protest. If he heard me approach, he never acknowledged.
“I don’t know sir, I think he missed the tag,” I offered after realizing he wasn’t going to even consider me.
The old man’s entire body wheeled on me; he was standing and he almost jumped at me as I offered my opinion. “You again. What in the %$#$# hell do you know? You can’t see either. I don’t know why we let you folk come over here. Bunch of blind %$#;s. The man pivoted back, suddenly clutching his stomach for a second, before regaining the laser-eyed look and resuming his interest in “the game.”
Truthfully, I was a little nervous about sharing the bleachers with the old guy, but once he settled back in and Darrin (of all people!) delivered a single up the middle, I took advantage of the old man’s change of mood by leaning back comfortably in my sky box.
His eyes blazed over for a second, then he returned back to the game and let me be. There was silence for an inning or so. The old guy plopped his faded jeans back in his seat and things were quiet for a while, though I couldn’t really tell whether the game was boring or if he wasn’t feeling so well. He would grab his stomach now and again, and with each wince it seemed his breathing would skip a bit. Still, his body language told me that how he felt on this particularly today wasn’t any of my business, so I just watched.
My attention wandered with the silence, and I found myself watching an outfield chase between two blue jays and a mockingbird. The overgrown outfield conditions were being put to good use, I guessed, as they cackled loudly while the old man and I sat in the summer Georgia sun.
Finally ending the silence, I gathered up the nerve to seek information from the old “fan.”
“Who’s pitching today?” I finally managed while the teams I suppose were changing sides.
At first I thought he wasn’t going to answer. He looked at me, turned away, then looked back again. With a sigh, I returned my gaze to the field. “Bobby’s pitching, who the hell you think?” he muttered and not so willingly.
“Yeah, Bobby. Good man, that Bobby.”
Nothing.
“Uh… sir? Bobby who?”
“Jesus, how am I supposed to watch the game with you over there. Shut your pie hole! Bobby Tretlin’s pitching!”
“I thought Bobby played third?”
“Hell no, Bobby’s never even heard of third. He’s a pitcher and an outfielder for Christ sakes!”
I crossed my legs and started wringing the sweat out on the ground. Focusing back on the field, I dared to go on. “Sir, uh, who’s playing third then?”
“%$# Timmy Warlock’s at third! Anymore questions or can I watch the game?”
“May I ask one more?”
“You just did, now get the hell outta here!”
“Sorry to bother you, but who’s the best player?”
“Huh?” His eyes and even his hat tilted up at this one, as if he couldn’t believe I didn’t know. For a split second, I actually detected a peaceful expression, but he quickly replaced it with his fire. Still, when his words came out, they were softer somewhat—more quietly delivered.
“Jonathan’s the best player,” he said. “Best glove, best arm, best bat. Jonathan’s the man. Yes sir.” He had tailed off at the end of the sentence, almost talking to somebody else. His face even seemed to regain some of its color.
Figuring this as good a stopping point as any, I left the old man alone. I had my names to investigate, he had his ball game to watch. “Have a great day, sir,” I offered politely as I slid off the bleachers, carefully avoiding splinters, and started away. “See you soon.” Pivoting off the bleachers onto the ground, I glanced back over my shoulder at the old guy while walking away.
He didn’t respond, just tilted his head ever so slightly at me. Going to the bill of his hat, he took it off, stroked his hair, put the cap back on, and returned to his game.
(3)
The locals didn’t have any information for me—none that mattered anyway. He was simply the crazy old man. “Every town has one of them,” a husky man at a gas station told me. “That old coot has been sitting there for years, yelling and carrying on. No one even pays attention to him anymore.”
A waitress was even less helpful. “What do you want to know about him for? You’re not from around here are you?”
“I think he got beat over the head so much when he was young, his brain just popped,” my nearest neighbor said. Her husband agreed. “I kinda stay clear of the old guy, myself.”
Flustered, I vowed to keep digging. Though at first it was because I had no life, it was now my mission. I had to laugh at the thought of this mission, but still, my curiosity was piqued. Climbing in my two-door, Chevy truck, I recalled what my teacher used to tell me years ago: When in doubt, go to the library. So I did.
I found it, without much trouble. It wasn’t much, just a one story, brick building just on the other side of town. Still, it was easy to find—a beauty of small places. And it proved fruitful.
It was well kept—shrubbery out front, a freshly painted sign, and the windows were being cleaned even as I drove up. Pulling into one of the spaces, I tried to unwrinkle my T-shirt somewhat and not appear as if I’d just crawled out of bed. No luck, but who cared? Somehow I just couldn’t picture too many people breathing right now that really cared what I looked like.
Inside, the help seemed friendly—a cheery young lady welcomed me and asked if there was anything she could do, just holler. Not wanting to intrude and being a bit shy around attractive women, I first walked past, but then thought better of it. “Maybe you could help me…” I began.
“Sure, ask.” She was probably in her 30’s, brown hair tied in a bun, glasses slipped comfortably over her nose, and she was dressed professionally—nice dress, polished shoes, the works. Her eyes were blue, inquisitive, her face didn’t appear as if a zit would ever have dared to rest there and it was evident she’d spent time outside of this place, judging from her tan. When she stood, her slim build made me guess she exercised somehow and she moved quickly from her seat to the end of her cubicle.
In layman’s terms, she was a babe, but I reminded myself of my quest and quickly silenced the devils perched on both my left and right shoulder blades.
“Well,” I’m not from around here,” I started again. Her laughter cut me off.
“Sorry,” the instant someone new comes in here, the whole town knows about it. Where you from?”
“Atlanta,” I brushed my hand at this, not wanting to discuss me. Still, she seemed genuinely interested—maybe not so much in me but a good listener out of habit.
“I was concerned about the old man at the….” Her laughter told me she knew who I was talking about.
“You were wondering about old George at the baseball field,” she finished. My opening eyes told her she’d nailed it, and I sat in silence waiting for her to continue. She reached across the desk and grabbed me by my hand. “Come. You need to talk to our head librarian, Mrs. Stewart.”
“Mrs. Stewart?”
“Yeah, she’s my mother. She can tell you everything you want to know. Be careful, though, she tends to run on a bit.”
She exited her desk and led me back through two narrow shelves of books—fiction - Ra-Ro, the sign announced. At the end of the aisle, a door faced us, and she stopped on the outside and pointed to the door. “Straight through, there’s her office.”
“His name is George Leonard,” Theresa Stewart began. She was probably late 60’s, early 70’s, hair matching her daughters save the color—a before/after picture if you will. She sat before her desk, pictures flanked her on all sides—certificates, photos of a man pulling in a huge fish, mother at daughter’s graduation, high school and college, a family photo, and a photo of a ground breaking, possibly of the building in which we now sat.
I had taken a seat in front of her desk, reminding of the days of getting sent to the principle’s office. I could have sworn it WAS the same chair back as my old school, one that made it impossible for me to sink down in my seat. It held me upright, made me face her front and center.
“What’s his story?” I began as I again refused her gesture towards the coffeepot that sat behind her. She tilted her head upward, sort of chuckled to no one in particular as she collected her thoughts and prepared to face me again. Her face was easy to look at, probably had knocked a few dead in her time, making it easy to see where her daughter got her looks.
“George has been sitting at that field for over ten years now. Ten years,” she said again for effect. “His wife left him, he’s got no family to speak of and his whole life is out there in those bleachers.”
I had given her my other names from the day before’s lineup—she knew them both. She stopped me while trying to recall one of the last names—as if the provided information was more than enough.
“They were all on that team—a good team, possible state contenders if you believe the papers.
“What happened?” I asked, shifting my leg up over my knee. It was a sitting position preferred by women and one that had actually gotten me my butt kicked in high school. Still, I could never bend my legs that much.
“His son, Jonathan, died. That’s what happened.” She shook her head, trying to clear the memories.
“Let me guess. Car accident. Killed by a drunk driver. Right?”
“No,” she looked up again. “Well, you’re half right. It was a car accident, though I’m afraid he was the drunk driver. I don’t know, I don’t know for sure. Families keep that sort of thing secret you know. Still, it is a small town….” She took a deep breath and continued. “They had just won the region championship - I believe that’s what it was. Anyway, apparently the team had a little celebration. Jonathan was on his way home from the North Carolina border—it’s only about twenty miles north you know. He rounded a curve too fast.” She snapped her fingers, signifying the quickness of his death. “Just like that.”
“God I hate to hear stuff like that.” I offered sincerely.
“Boy, don’t we all,” she agreed. “You know, death is a tough thing no matter where you are. But to me, it seems to be intensified in a small town. I don’t know, everybody knows so much about each other—everybody IS a part of each other. Somebody young like that goes, the whole town’s in shock. For months, years even.”
I paused, uncrossed my legs. “So the old man never recovered.”
“You could say that,” she nodded, looking at her desk for comfort. “He still goes out there every spring and summer. Still cheers the team on. Same names, same team, same tournament coming up. He never let it go.”
“Poor guy.”
“Yes, people tried to help him at first. But he was a stubborn old guy before the accident. Now…he’s ten times worse. Still, he doesn’t bother a soul, and he’s got more passion than most sane people I know. You gotta hand him that.”
I left without further interrupted her day. She assured me she wasn’t busy. Since I wasn’t either, I looked for her daughter on the way out. She was going through files while talking on the phone.
Jesus wept.
(4)
I found the tools in the shed of my cabin, though I didn’t need many. In fact, a lawn mower, some clippers and a bunch of trash bags would do just fine. I had come out to the garage right after awakening, almost on autopilot. I had spotted the mower across the spider webs and dust balls. Straddling boxes, discarded furniture and more webs, I spotted a gas can right next to it. With enough gas luckily in it, I filled the tank and started the mower. Oddly enough, it perked to life on the third try, though the original sound told me it wasn’t too happy about it.
Loading the truck, I made the half-mile drive to the ball field. Pulling into the graveled “parking lot” this marked the first time of my stay when I was glad the old man wasn’t there. Guess it would be hard to mow grass in the middle of the third inning. I laughed to myself picturing it. Exactly how mad would the guy get? Even pictured him and his bird legs chasing me through the outfield, around the bases, up through the bleachers and out into the parking lot, hitting me with his game program, or Pepsi cups, or whatever he could find for ammo.
But no, today was another off day for the team. Perhaps they had a road game, I wasn’t really sure.
The sun announced its presence with authority, but I barely noticed. Instead, it was Wendy’s sacks, discarded beer bottles, plastic sacks, brown bags, bottle caps, and good Lord the rocks! A ball hit on this infield would carom away as if on a bumper pool table.
Still, I used an abandoned cardboard box that had just enough weight on it to use to drag the infield with. It was archaic, but it got the baby rocks off and pulled some more to the surface. From there, it was me testing out my own rusty arm, firing rocks into the woods, aiming for trees, laughing at myself and my body for being so out of shape. It was work, but it was fun. After all, when's the last time a working man when out in his backyard to fire rocks at trees?
So the next day I came back and I worked some more. The following day, ditto. It was the next day when my "work" was interrupted.
Apparently, there was a game going on. The old man was there but I still figured I could run out and drag the infield between innings. Right? Perhaps not.
“Get your #@$% off the field sonny! We’re trying to play a game here!” The old man’s voice was a direct opposite of his appearance. I would’ve sworn there was no way a bellow of that pitch could have come from a skinny old man with chicken legs and a jacket pulled up around his throat.
But it did. Boy did it ever.
I wasn't going to leave, though, so I waited. I waited in the “dugout,” not really sure how to proceed. Cleaning up while waiting, it was the old man who gave me my cue. “Now you can drag the &%$# infield. The inning’s over. Hurry up, would you?”
I laughed at the thought of it. An old man sitting, screaming at an abandon field. A younger man running out across it all with a cardboard box. What’s going on here anyway?
Yes, I guess you could say that it was official: an insane man had become my insanity - he and his field and his passions. I laughed constantly in the days that followed, not at myself, but from reactions I got from the locals. Heads shook, windows rolled down, laughter traveled across my infield and reached my ears. “Must be a relative,” I heard one of them say.
Still, to their credit, they never once got out of their car and offered to kick my ass. I have to give them credit for that. Growing up in a small town, I found it quite unusual not to be goaded, or to have my manhood questioned, or my sanity.
They just rolled their windows back up and kept moving. Hell, they should thank me. I gave them something to talk about while I was there.
Through it all, I worked. The grass was now mowed, though I’m sure the motor is now shot due to shooting out all the rocks. My cardboard box was replaced and reinforced by three more I had purchased at the local hardware store. No, I won’t even go into the looks the man gave me when he sold them to me. For a second, I didn’t even think he was going to accept my cash. He did, though, but not before rolling his eyes and giving me this look; this look that told me who I should realize how stupid I am.
Whatever. Silly humans.
It was about a week later when it happened. I myself had declared this a day off, the old man and the doubleheader be damned. With blisters on my hands, a sore arm from all the rock throwing, and needing a general break from my four-to-eight hour days on the field, my schedule for today was a jog and a lot of sleep - nothing more.
I rounded the corner, the same corner I had first noticed the old man a couple weeks earlier. This time it wasn’t the man or his voice that captured my attention. It was the flashing lights of the ambulance. It was the sound of the gurney clanging out of the back of the truck. It was the urgent voices of the medics. It was the old man being placed on the gurney, being loaded carefully. He looked… horrible, even thinner if possible. His face was bone thin, his hair was matted and everywhere, his eyes were closed. But I think it was his mouth that got me - that closed mouth with no sound coming out. It was so depressingly silent, so scary, so threatening.
They loaded him on the back and they carted him off, leaving me standing, gaping, at an empty baseball field with no spectators.
(5)
The old man was terminally ill. Cancer. Spreading. Too far gone. It had started in the colon, but it had quickly attached itself to the rest of the body. In fact, the liver was the next victim and after that…
I guess you could say my first visit to see the old guy wasn't exactly met with open arms. No, instead he turned and spit in a cup and actually turned up the television. Still, I could be stubborn too, so I didn't leave. There he sat in pajamas, his pillow filled with his flying hair, his mouth open, ready to accept the next syllable from the newsman before he'd go into a tirade.
I stood in running shorts; eventually I sat, invitations be damned.
Finally, he glanced at me again and, having no choice, he accepted my presence. "Why are you here?"
Staring at my running shoes as if for answers, I started to speak, then stopped. After all, why was I here? "Don't you have anything better to do than pity some dying old fart? You trying to clear your conscience about something? Is that what it is? What the hell do you want? Don't you have anything better to do with yourself than hang around me and drag the infields at baseball games for Christ sakes?"
I looked him dead in the eye; he expected me to turn away, but I didn't. "You know, sir, I've been doing something very important this past week or so."
"You haven't done #$@. That's just what's wrong with kids these days, they think they're so #@# important. What the hell have you done?"
"I've been giving your son a better place to play, that's what I've done."
The man turned and his mouth opened—but nothing came out. Opened again, nothing. He dropped his gaze, turned back to the field, lowered his head. Then the old man did something so unexpected my mouth dropped open as well. He began to cry. Loud. Unashamedly.
I started to close the distance, then thought better of it. Instead I sat, then gazed back out at the field, trying to imagine those days when his son, Jonathan was king and papa was the most proud.
He lifted his head minutes later, recovering as quickly as his pride would let him. Slowly, he lifted his head and peered out, collecting his thoughts, sorting his memories. He never looked over at me, but when he began talking, I had to move closer just to hear him. His voice was … different somehow… without the edge of tough years, without the tone of power, without much of anything but—I guess peace would be the word, something I hadn’t come to expect from the guy.
“God, he had an arm,” he said. “Run, catch, throw, hit, you name it. Speed, jeez he could get down that line. A sacrifice bunt was a double he was so damn fast. Saw him strike out 16 in a seven inning game. Two homers off of Santos over in Rabun, a no-hitter in the region finals one year. Grades? Hell he made A’s, maybe a couple of B’s. Had friends coming and going always. Not just because of his talents. Hell, he was a nice kid.” It almost sounded as if he was pleading for someone to believe him, to bring him back. “Never bothered a soul. Never bragged. Just loved to run and jump and play. Would somebody please tell me what’s wrong with that? Wh…” He couldn’t finish.
At first, I didn’t even consider saying anything. The man needed his words, needed this time. But when he dropped his head again and tears flowed out, my body moved over there before my mind could stop me. I stood, uncomfortably at first, behind him and his chair. And I did the only thing that a person can do in a situation like this. My left hand reached out and touched the man on the shoulder, a reassuring gesture. Not a hard grip, but firm enough to let him know that he was being held, that some people really did understand, some people really could feel some of his pain, though perhaps not take it all away.
He felt it… he really did. I saw the goose bumps run up and down his arms, could literally feel his hair prick up somewhat. He stiffened at my touch, slowly brought his head up—didn’t say a word.
“Bless you George,” I said. “Bless you.” I put my other hand on his other shoulder, gave him a firm squeeze, then walked out the door.
(6)
That was our last conversation, though I did see him one last time before he moved off to watch his son play on greener fields, bigger stadiums, and in front of more fans. He wasn’t well and he was in great pain, but he was still happy.
“The bases are loaded for Christ sakes! Don’t %$^ bother me now. Jonathan’s up. Aren’t you people watching?”
His eyes were closed, his jaws were clenching in pain, his hands were on his stomach, but he was announcing that game as if by doing so, his voice or what he was seeing could somehow make it all go away.
I had walked in – the nurses at the desk just nodded me through. What did they care if I wanted to see some crazy old man? Nobody else had bothered to give him a visit, let the man have a visitor.
“Look for the CURVE BALL, Jonathan, the CURVE BALL. He’d be an idiot to throw you a fast one. Come on, use your head sonny. Use your noggin’.”
Me and my McDonalds sack plopped down in the chair, watched the old man, listened to the game. The way he was calling it, and grimacing, and calling it some more, heck I was interested in how it would come out.
“MAN it doesn’t get any better than this. Bases juiced, two outs, down by a run, bottom of the last inning. It’s enough to make an old man older, I tell ya’. OLDER!”
He grabbed his gut again after yelling older, pressed his bony hands almost into his innards.
I was on the edge of my seat, just waiting for his call. Surely Jonathan would come through for the old man, right? Surely there was a God.
“What’s the count?” I asked.
“QUIET! It’s 2-1, keep up. Watch the game!”
He snapped at me so quickly I wanted to watch it; really I did.
A nurse peered in, wondering if the old man had lost it again or, maybe just maybe, she wanted to know what the score was, too. I put my fingers to my lips, perhaps overstepping my bounds in telling her to keep quiet in her own habitat. So what? You heard the man. The bases were juiced. Two-one count, bottom of the last inning. And Jonathan was up for Christ sakes!
She winked at me, then looked at George sadly. I found myself closing my eyes, not wishing to feel his pain, but wanting, oh so wanting Jonathan to deliver. I, too, was picturing him out on that field, that clean field minus all the debris – minus all those beer cans, minus all those Wendy’s sacks and bottle caps, and 8 X 11 school papers and faded, torn crap that I didn’t even know what it was. On that field with the base paths wiped down, the grass trimmed just so in the infield, a little looser in the outfield, the batter’s box smoothed out just so.
There he was. Jonathan up. A beautiful spring day. The locals not giving a good damn about anything. Nothing, that is, except Jonathan delivering, somehow taking this pitch down the pipe and tattooing it over the wall. A mob at home plate. The “crowd” on its feet. The whole world right, at least for a day.
“HEEEEEY!” My eyes opened as George bounced up, practically bouncing to his feet in reaction.
“Go ball! GO BALL! GO! GO!”
“Home run?” I asked.
“HELL no, it’s off the wall.” George didn’t even look at me. Tears were running down his face. He lay back down in pain but his eyes were still open, his little fists pumping in the air. One run, come on, hurry, two runs! Hurry damn it. Beat the throw, beat the throw!”
I closed my eyes to see the throw. Saw the leftfielder play the carom perfectly off the wall, turn with his hat flying off and throwing it for all he was worth to the cut off man. The shortstop, the stated cut off man, taking the throw and humming that pill through the Georgia sky, the runner hauling his butt as if a propeller was inside it. Running, running, the ball carrying, the catching waiting, waiting, the umpire with his mask off. WAITING.
“He’s SAFE!” I almost swore I saw it exactly as George called it. The runner sliding in, Jonathan just standing on second watching the whole thing, the ump leaning forward, the dust flying up, the crowd leaning in, most lining the fences.
“He’s safe! He’s safe! He’s safe!”
George’s pain got the best of him here. He curled up in the fetal position, tears rolled down his face, he let out a scream. It was half happiness, half pain. Unfortunately, it sounded mostly like pain.
Still, I noticed a smile on that face underneath the tears. An almost peaceful look behind the expression; a man who could die while he was still on top of the world, A man who just watched his boy double in three to win the game in the county championship; a man who could swear that everything would work on just fine as long as you did the right thing, paid your taxes, made good decisions and kept your nose clean.
Yes, George Leonard was a man who could die in peace, pain be damned.
And that’s exactly what he did.
The nurse and I were both silent. We were both riled up from the game; both so happy for Jonathan, and George and all the happiness in town that day. To see him do that and then just… die. Well, it was … almost paradoxical to see such happiness and glee and then…death.
She walked over, slowly, lifted the sheet above his eyes. She looked at me. Walked over. Patted me on the arm.
“Bless you, too, sonny.”
Then she walked out.
(7)
It was September the 15th the day he died, for those of you scoring at home. At 2:15 in the afternoon, right there in front of me, me with my unopened Big Mac and my soft drink. Right in front of the nurse and her cute little hat. The local paper ran the smallest of blurbs, only a paragraph. Newspapers often can fuel my anger, and when I saw that man’s life reduced to a paragraph well hidden on page 15D of a small paper, I couldn’t help but get a little hot. What the hell was on the first three sections, and the first 14 sections of D? Page 15D. One paragraph.
But still I smiled. Because the best news rarely does get in newspapers, nor do the best people. He didn’t want news or deadlines, the results of meetings somewhere in rooms with round tables and coffee served and minutes kept. He didn’t want his picture, didn’t want conversation.
He loved the game. He enjoyed the smell of the grass. The crack of the bat. The sound of the ball hitting leather, the whip throw to second, the pivot and the snap throw to first, the look back at the ump. He enjoyed grabbing his kid by the hat and giving him a quick pat on the back. Just a whack on the back. A day at the ball field. One more bag of popcorn. Come on, just one more inning. What’s wrong with that? Could anyone tell me?
I threw the paper aside. Thoughts fought for priority in my head. None of them won out. Confused, I sat back down, then got up again. Had no idea what I was going to do, no idea how to pay tribute.
In the end, I drove north. It even reminded me of that first day jogging, the first day I saw the man. I parked my car on Route 176, right there by this old run, down, dilapidated ball field. The grass had popped back up and with a passion. Tree limbs were again over the outfield fences. Candy wrappers, beer cans and assorted results of nights out were gathered everywhere.
I didn’t walk out on the field as I had intended. Instead, I sat in the bleachers, right in the middle. Who knows, I may have seen some kind of game myself, probably spoke out loud, probably had people wondering about me as they drove past. But this I remember, and if you choose not to believe me, most would tell you that’s probably a good thing. In fact, pat yourself on the back if you don’t. After all, it means you’re sane.
Me, I looked up, and dang if the sun didn’t peek its way between two clouds, not a full shot, but a cameo, a teaser shot if you will. No, I don’t consider myself vain, but somehow I knew that peak was mine, those rays and the gentle wind that blew through my hair was for me and for me only.
The wind and sun brought out the goose bumps, and it was while peering back out at the field when I heard it. Whether it came from inside of me, from the sun or wind, or if from my imagination, I don’t know. I don’t care. I only know and heard this:
“Son, if you’re feeling sad right now, then you’re missing the whole point.” That was the voice, that was what I heard and that was what I chose to act on. It sounded sort of like the old guy, though in a more muffled, far away voice. My hair stood up, a car passing by would have laughed at the young guy sitting fully erect on a field in the middle of nowhere.
I laughed. So hard I cried. And I sat staring out at that field. How long? Not a clue. But eventually I got up, and instead of walking out to keep the field in good shape, I started slowly back to my car. The field had its day and they were good ones. Change happens. New fields are being built somewhere. Future stars are off somewhere learning the fundamentals.
I stopped at the car and looked out again. Gazed back at the sun. The old man and Jonathan would be just fine. They always would be. The field in front of me needed no more attention.
After all, my two friends had found a better place to play.
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