This post does not contain news for my readers who are game-watching Carolina fans. I wrote this to experiment with sports writing and to attempt to explain some elements of football to those unfamiliar with the sport. I also wrote it to document some details of the last regulation drive that I hope to not forget. For a closer look, read Lee Pace's story from the sidelines.
The Tar Heels had a rare opportunity tonight to win a bowl game they appeared to have lost to Tennessee. And they seized it. I know not all of you enjoy or understand football, but the following true account of events at the end of regulation would astound almost anyone.
Trailing by a field goal with 1:36 to go in the game, Carolina turned the ball over on downs with two timeouts left after Dwight Jones dropped a pass that would have kept a game-winning drive alive. All Tennessee had to do to win the game was get one first down by advancing the ball ten yards in four plays. The Volunteers tried to run the ball up the middle three times, but the Tar Heels stuffed each attempt and burned both remaining timeouts. Tennessee had to punt the ball to the Heels, who had the daunting task of scoring at least a field goal from their own 20-yard line in 31 seconds with no timeouts remaining. This is where the embedded video below begins.
Football coaches refer to these game-ending offensive drives as two-minute drills because they typically take two minutes to complete without using any timeouts. Carolina had a fraction of that time.
On the first play of the drive, quarterback T.J. Yates threw a 28-yard pass to Todd Harrelson, who was illegally hit helmet-to-helmet by a Volunteer defender. The officials added an extra 15 yards to the end of the play. Now Carolina had the ball on the Tennessee 37-yard line and was almost close enough to kick a game-tying field goal. Carolina's chances were not slim anymore.
The Heels needed to gain a few more yards to be in field goal range, and they appeared to do exactly that with a seven-yard completion to Dwight Jones. However, the referees claimed to have blown a whistle before the snap to stop the game and review Harrelson's catch; the officials cannot legally review a play after the next play starts. None of the 22 players on the field appeared to have heard the whistle and executed the play at full speed. The officials ruled the seven-yard gain null and began a long video review to determine whether Harrelson hung onto the ball after the helmet-to-helmet collision. After four long minutes, they decided that the video evidence could not disprove the ruling on the field that Harrelson caught the ball.
And so with only 25 seconds remaining to get into field goal range, the Carolina players and coaches needed to exercise clock management.
Football teams can stop the game clock between plays without using timeouts by running the ball out of bounds, throwing an incomplete pass, or spiking the ball immediately after hiking it. The clock continues to run if a ball carrier goes down between the sidelines. If a ball carrier goes down after getting a first down, the game clock stops momentarily for the officials to reset the first-down marker but starts running again before the next play begins. Two-minute drills utilize passing and running plays to either sideline for these reasons.
Yates threw another pass, this time for 12 yards, to Dwight Jones for a first down. A Volunteer defender delivered an obvious late hit that the officials either missed or ignored. Then Yates spiked the ball to stop the clock since Jones did not get out of bounds. On 2nd and 10 from the Tennessee 25 with about 16 seconds remaining, most fans expected the Heels to attempt a field goal or run one more passing play. Neither happened when Yates handed off the ball to Shaun Draughn, who gained seven yards to the Tennessee 18. The clock continued to tick from 11 seconds when Draughn hit the ground. The Heels needed to line up and spike the ball to stop the clock so that Casey Barth could have enough time to kick the tying field goal. Chaos ensued instead.
The offensive players scrambled into position on the field while an additional seven or eight players from the field goal unit mistakenly ran onto the field because of a lack of communication. Some of the mistaken players ran back to the sideline when they saw Yates still standing behind the center. Several others, including the kicker and holder, did not. Yates, frustrated with having too many men on the field and seeing that only two seconds remained, made the game-saving decision to snap and spike the ball anyway. The clock ran down to :00.
The Tennessee players and fans celebrated because they thought the game was over after Carolina's personnel and clock management errors. A referee confirmed the apparent when he announced that the game was over. Carolina appeared to have lost its third straight bowl game, and this time it was simply because of poor communication. The two head coaches met at midfield for a post-game handshake. Yates shook hands with a Tennessee player. A slew of Carolina players jogged off the field. But then, over all the jubilant Tennessee noise, another referee strained to explain that the previous play was under review.
Of course the replay showed that Carolina had too many men on the field, but, more importantly, it also showed that the spiked ball hit the ground before the clock expired. The officials assessed a five-yard penalty for having too many men on the field but also awarded the Heels with one final play with a fraction of a second left on the clock. Carolina kicker Casey Barth would have a chance to kick a 40-yard field goal to send the game into overtime. The confusion was so great that the clock actually read :00 when both teams were set for the next play. This changed to :01, and mere seconds later Barth sent the game-tying field goal through the uprights despite drawing a roughing-the-kicker penalty flag.
Carolina players reported after the game that Tennessee fans hurled items onto the field in disgust. A Tennessee player threw his helmet and received an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty to be assessed with the roughing penalty on Carolina's opening overtime possession. The Volunteers committed three personal foul penalties in the last 30 seconds of regulation; they had mentally shut down.
The game was unique because overtime was not nearly as exciting as the end of regulation. Both teams scored touchdowns on their first possessions, but Carolina linebacker Quan Sturdivant intercepted Tennessee quarterback Tyler Bray's pass on the second possession. Barth kicked the game-winning field goal soon after. Head coach Butch Davis received his first celebratory dousing as a Tar Heel.
It was Carolina's first bowl win since 2001.
Friday, December 31, 2010
Saturday, December 4, 2010
Wrangled
My family bought me clothes as holiday gifts for most of my adult life. I never asked for clothes for Christmas, but they always knew what I needed when I did not. Blue jeans, collared shirts, undershirts, coats, gloves and those warm pants with the lines on them always found their way to my family’s Christmas tree in suburban Chicago. Most boys dismissed these types of gifts, but I appreciated them. Growing took a visible toll on my adolescent wardrobe and appearance. My shirts became so small that the armpits discolored with deodorant stains. Sitting transformed my blue jeans into denim capris. I figured I would dress myself in style permanently and economically once I stopped getting bigger.
Bigger is a funny word because it has two dimensions. I stopped getting taller in my mid teens and enjoyed some glorious years of size stability. I never imagined I would grow wider but indeed began to last summer. Shorts were not on my list of holiday gifts because I wore the same pair for 14 years. The length was just right. And when my waist became an issue last summer, I undid the button and let the zipper do the holding. That little trick was permissible in a sweat-drenched summer full of poolside sunbathing and book reading. I thought I might do the same thing with my pants in the fall until I saw a television commercial that made me serious about blue jeans. I saw Brett Favre play football comfortably in tough, lasting Wranglers.
I used to play in an annual tackle football game on the Friday after Thanksgiving, a lasting tradition known to the Libertyville High School class of 2006 as the Turkey Bowl. The rosters consisted of former high school athletes and sports fans. We played the game in all conditions, so nobody thought to wear blue jeans except for the unfortunate few who did not know what to expect for their first game. I woke up those Saturday mornings with a sore body, a bruised ego and a destroyed pair of pants. Brett Favre would not.
I am not a Brett Favre fan, and I do not approve of his alleged improprieties. But man can that guy have fun playing football with his friends in rugged blue jeans. He drives to his friendly games in a pickup truck with his dog to meet 13 friends who all decide to wear Wrangler blue jeans because they are also tough guys who play football in tough blue jeans. The truck is a little weathered, the jeans are a little weathered, and Favre’s face looks like an old catcher’s mitt. But this is all awesome because that is where we all are headed. I want to be 72 years old and call up a baker’s dozen to play football in a country meadow. I want to be bad to the bone like Brett.
My growing waist size and this commercial convinced me to buy a pair of Wranglers, so my girlfriend and I spent a nice little Saturday in the fitting rooms at the Durham Wal-Mart. I was surprised to discover that Wranglers come in different styles. I tried the regular style first. They were enormous. They looked like carpenter’s jeans without the hammer loop. They were not what I remembered from the commercial and would not do. The original cowboy style deserved its name. The fly zipper was a foot long and would wrap all the way back to my rear end. I decided not to try the original cowboy.
Most of the styles were too big. The only style that would fit a guy like me was slim straight. One pair will do, I thought. Wranglers last forever. Wal-Mart did not have my size, so I ordered my one pair of Wranglers in the parking lot on my iPhone. They arrived yesterday, and I have worn them ever since. I am sorry to admit they look a lot like the Gap jeans my parents bought me years ago. They are as yuppie as Wrangler can get, but they are Wrangler in name. I am ready to play some pickup football. I am ready to wrangle.
Bigger is a funny word because it has two dimensions. I stopped getting taller in my mid teens and enjoyed some glorious years of size stability. I never imagined I would grow wider but indeed began to last summer. Shorts were not on my list of holiday gifts because I wore the same pair for 14 years. The length was just right. And when my waist became an issue last summer, I undid the button and let the zipper do the holding. That little trick was permissible in a sweat-drenched summer full of poolside sunbathing and book reading. I thought I might do the same thing with my pants in the fall until I saw a television commercial that made me serious about blue jeans. I saw Brett Favre play football comfortably in tough, lasting Wranglers.
I used to play in an annual tackle football game on the Friday after Thanksgiving, a lasting tradition known to the Libertyville High School class of 2006 as the Turkey Bowl. The rosters consisted of former high school athletes and sports fans. We played the game in all conditions, so nobody thought to wear blue jeans except for the unfortunate few who did not know what to expect for their first game. I woke up those Saturday mornings with a sore body, a bruised ego and a destroyed pair of pants. Brett Favre would not.
I am not a Brett Favre fan, and I do not approve of his alleged improprieties. But man can that guy have fun playing football with his friends in rugged blue jeans. He drives to his friendly games in a pickup truck with his dog to meet 13 friends who all decide to wear Wrangler blue jeans because they are also tough guys who play football in tough blue jeans. The truck is a little weathered, the jeans are a little weathered, and Favre’s face looks like an old catcher’s mitt. But this is all awesome because that is where we all are headed. I want to be 72 years old and call up a baker’s dozen to play football in a country meadow. I want to be bad to the bone like Brett.
My growing waist size and this commercial convinced me to buy a pair of Wranglers, so my girlfriend and I spent a nice little Saturday in the fitting rooms at the Durham Wal-Mart. I was surprised to discover that Wranglers come in different styles. I tried the regular style first. They were enormous. They looked like carpenter’s jeans without the hammer loop. They were not what I remembered from the commercial and would not do. The original cowboy style deserved its name. The fly zipper was a foot long and would wrap all the way back to my rear end. I decided not to try the original cowboy.
Most of the styles were too big. The only style that would fit a guy like me was slim straight. One pair will do, I thought. Wranglers last forever. Wal-Mart did not have my size, so I ordered my one pair of Wranglers in the parking lot on my iPhone. They arrived yesterday, and I have worn them ever since. I am sorry to admit they look a lot like the Gap jeans my parents bought me years ago. They are as yuppie as Wrangler can get, but they are Wrangler in name. I am ready to play some pickup football. I am ready to wrangle.
Monday, October 18, 2010
All bad things must come to an end
Carolina ended a 29-year losing streak in Charlottesville this weekend with a 44-10 drubbing of the Cavaliers. You might remember my promise in 2008 to return to Charlottesville in 2010 after Carolina's overtime loss. I did.
I found five other Tar Heels who promised the same. We had a good tailgate and a good trip, but nothing compared to Carolina's first play from scrimmage, an 81-yard strike from T.J. Yates to Dwight Jones. You would see a terrific frenzy in the video below if my camera was ready. Instead you must settle for empty Virginia seats and a celebration well after the game was practically finished.
Fans should know that the Carolina section chanted "Butch Davis" despite ongoing investigations. Even stranger was the "T.J. Yates" cheer, which was possibly the senior's first. Yates threw for 249 yards in the first half alone.
Whether your beef was 2008, 1996 or some other heart breaker, I think you will agree with me in saying I wish we scored a few more.
I found five other Tar Heels who promised the same. We had a good tailgate and a good trip, but nothing compared to Carolina's first play from scrimmage, an 81-yard strike from T.J. Yates to Dwight Jones. You would see a terrific frenzy in the video below if my camera was ready. Instead you must settle for empty Virginia seats and a celebration well after the game was practically finished.
Fans should know that the Carolina section chanted "Butch Davis" despite ongoing investigations. Even stranger was the "T.J. Yates" cheer, which was possibly the senior's first. Yates threw for 249 yards in the first half alone.
Whether your beef was 2008, 1996 or some other heart breaker, I think you will agree with me in saying I wish we scored a few more.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
God bless those Tar Heel boys
UNC Chancellor Holden Thorp, athletic director Dick Baddour and football head coach Butch Davis informed the press last Thursday that the NCAA's player-agent relations investigation had expanded to include possible academic misconduct by an unspecified number of players. The press conference began with the chancellor's sobering apology.
"To everyone who loves this University, I am sorry for what I have to tell you." Not many good things could come after those words, and nothing did. He gave no names and looked like he wanted to cry. The athletic director was his usual smug self. Coach Davis looked pale.
Davis said the academic improprieties involved one tutor who, incredibly, was also his teenage son's tutor. The chancellor and athletic director emphasized their complete support of and belief in the coach despite the player-agent probe, the academic misconduct and the admission that the tutor in question was once under the private employ of the head coach himself.
Independent news outlets reported that six to 12 players were involved in the academic probe and two might have had improper contact with an agent. Most of Carolina's six projected first-round draft picks were under fire and playing with the world's most talented scout team in practice. The best defense in the country might never see the field. The season Carolina fans knew was coming four years ago might die a week before its birth.
The season opener against LSU is the most prolific in decades, but most Carolina fans have not thought about or mentioned the Tigers since Thursday night. Something much bigger than a game or a season is suddenly at stake. Academic integrity was something we took for granted in Chapel Hill. Our coaches recruited promising youth, and most players delivered on the promise on the field and elsewhere. We enjoyed a sterling reputation and swelled with pride whenever the blue, our blue, spilled out of the tunnel with the thunder of the bell. A few kids took that away from hundreds of thousands of alumni without thinking twice.
I stewed for days. Conversations with my friends focused on speculation instead of emotion. Who had moved to the scout team? Would the professors expel or suspend the players? Would Davis stay at Carolina for the whole season? When would the investigation conclude? Will we play the right players Saturday night after only a week of investigation? I realized a couple days ago that the only person I had heard talk about his own emotional reaction was the chancellor. I decided to be the next in line.
I told my friends I was shocked and angry.
The shock comes from being an alumnus who has a faith in his university. I believe that people tell the truth when they say they do things the right way. I think the people who hired Carolina's coaches love the University as much as I do. I think the coaches recruit players who can win and represent the University in the way it deserves. For a privileged football player to do something he knows is wrong is unintelligent and, as I mentioned before, blatantly disregards alumni. Such a player probably does not care about the University in the same way I do.
The anger comes from looking forward to football season for the 34 to 39 weeks in which my world recedes to a comparatively boring slumber. Each start of the college football season more than neutralizes the end of each two-month vacation. I write e-mail reminders to my friends about college colors day. I write football word problems for my classes. I walk to Kenan Stadium to see the empty bleachers and hear the silent noise. I am a child in September.
My friends and I decided months ago to travel to the game at Virginia instead of the LSU game in Atlanta. Still, my friends could not get Sept. 4 off their minds. My friend Will invited people to come to his house at 4:30 p.m. and depart at 6 a.m. We were simply excited. We were going to have more fun in Chapel Hill than we would have had in Atlanta. This passion dissuaded Will from telling me the bad news two days before the press conference.
"You were the last person I would tell," he said. "I just couldn't."
Carolina had never enthused me less. I felt embarrassed to have gotten so excited about football. "Go Heels" disappeared from my vocabulary. I wanted information second only to resolution, but I had to wait for both as the LSU game worked its way up my calendar. I wondered how this season would feel. Would I be shocked and angry for the next three months?
My friend Stephanie joked that we should not pin our happiness on college kids playing sports. My friend Kim said something like this should not happen at Carolina. My friend Will said the University would sort it out and get the right players on the field.
Each conversation was a microcosm of my week-long emotional process; I started with anger but progressed to a familiar sense of ownership. These are our players. I remember basketball head coach Roy Williams addressing students toward the end of the football season in Hamilton Hall in his first year in Chapel Hill. A student asked Williams if he supported then-football head coach John Bunting, who was struggling to win games.
"Of course I support John," he said. "He is our coach. He is our coach." Williams paused for emphasis and took the next question. His message was not lost on me then, and it is coming back to me now.
Of course Bunting's folly, losing, fell on the better side of the morality fence. But even if he did something morally wrong, he still would have been one of us, a title that has no clear qualifications. I want to say the degree seals the deal, but I think our undergraduate players and current students are among us as well. What is it that makes someone a Tar Heel? Can somebody do something that makes him not a Tar Heel anymore? I am not sure that is possible.
Some of our players allegedly did something wrong, but we can take comfort in the leadership in Chapel Hill. The chancellor said we would "get to the bottom of this." Some players will play. Some players will not. All of them are Tar Heels. I stand by my team.
God bless those Tar Heel boys.
Beat LSU.
"To everyone who loves this University, I am sorry for what I have to tell you." Not many good things could come after those words, and nothing did. He gave no names and looked like he wanted to cry. The athletic director was his usual smug self. Coach Davis looked pale.
Davis said the academic improprieties involved one tutor who, incredibly, was also his teenage son's tutor. The chancellor and athletic director emphasized their complete support of and belief in the coach despite the player-agent probe, the academic misconduct and the admission that the tutor in question was once under the private employ of the head coach himself.
Independent news outlets reported that six to 12 players were involved in the academic probe and two might have had improper contact with an agent. Most of Carolina's six projected first-round draft picks were under fire and playing with the world's most talented scout team in practice. The best defense in the country might never see the field. The season Carolina fans knew was coming four years ago might die a week before its birth.
The season opener against LSU is the most prolific in decades, but most Carolina fans have not thought about or mentioned the Tigers since Thursday night. Something much bigger than a game or a season is suddenly at stake. Academic integrity was something we took for granted in Chapel Hill. Our coaches recruited promising youth, and most players delivered on the promise on the field and elsewhere. We enjoyed a sterling reputation and swelled with pride whenever the blue, our blue, spilled out of the tunnel with the thunder of the bell. A few kids took that away from hundreds of thousands of alumni without thinking twice.
I stewed for days. Conversations with my friends focused on speculation instead of emotion. Who had moved to the scout team? Would the professors expel or suspend the players? Would Davis stay at Carolina for the whole season? When would the investigation conclude? Will we play the right players Saturday night after only a week of investigation? I realized a couple days ago that the only person I had heard talk about his own emotional reaction was the chancellor. I decided to be the next in line.
I told my friends I was shocked and angry.
The shock comes from being an alumnus who has a faith in his university. I believe that people tell the truth when they say they do things the right way. I think the people who hired Carolina's coaches love the University as much as I do. I think the coaches recruit players who can win and represent the University in the way it deserves. For a privileged football player to do something he knows is wrong is unintelligent and, as I mentioned before, blatantly disregards alumni. Such a player probably does not care about the University in the same way I do.
The anger comes from looking forward to football season for the 34 to 39 weeks in which my world recedes to a comparatively boring slumber. Each start of the college football season more than neutralizes the end of each two-month vacation. I write e-mail reminders to my friends about college colors day. I write football word problems for my classes. I walk to Kenan Stadium to see the empty bleachers and hear the silent noise. I am a child in September.
My friends and I decided months ago to travel to the game at Virginia instead of the LSU game in Atlanta. Still, my friends could not get Sept. 4 off their minds. My friend Will invited people to come to his house at 4:30 p.m. and depart at 6 a.m. We were simply excited. We were going to have more fun in Chapel Hill than we would have had in Atlanta. This passion dissuaded Will from telling me the bad news two days before the press conference.
"You were the last person I would tell," he said. "I just couldn't."
Carolina had never enthused me less. I felt embarrassed to have gotten so excited about football. "Go Heels" disappeared from my vocabulary. I wanted information second only to resolution, but I had to wait for both as the LSU game worked its way up my calendar. I wondered how this season would feel. Would I be shocked and angry for the next three months?
My friend Stephanie joked that we should not pin our happiness on college kids playing sports. My friend Kim said something like this should not happen at Carolina. My friend Will said the University would sort it out and get the right players on the field.
Each conversation was a microcosm of my week-long emotional process; I started with anger but progressed to a familiar sense of ownership. These are our players. I remember basketball head coach Roy Williams addressing students toward the end of the football season in Hamilton Hall in his first year in Chapel Hill. A student asked Williams if he supported then-football head coach John Bunting, who was struggling to win games.
"Of course I support John," he said. "He is our coach. He is our coach." Williams paused for emphasis and took the next question. His message was not lost on me then, and it is coming back to me now.
Of course Bunting's folly, losing, fell on the better side of the morality fence. But even if he did something morally wrong, he still would have been one of us, a title that has no clear qualifications. I want to say the degree seals the deal, but I think our undergraduate players and current students are among us as well. What is it that makes someone a Tar Heel? Can somebody do something that makes him not a Tar Heel anymore? I am not sure that is possible.
Some of our players allegedly did something wrong, but we can take comfort in the leadership in Chapel Hill. The chancellor said we would "get to the bottom of this." Some players will play. Some players will not. All of them are Tar Heels. I stand by my team.
God bless those Tar Heel boys.
Beat LSU.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Laps
My mom loves to walk laps at the hospital. After her leukemia diagnosis months ago, a doctor told our family she did not want to see my mom in bed in the middle of the day. She wanted her sitting on the couch or exercising in the hallways. She wanted her to live her life in the hospital as she would out of the hospital.
My mom walked before for the health of it, but she stopped a few years ago. Of course she had an excellent reason to start again, so we walked the figure-eight hematology inpatient ward for half-hour segments. The nurses smiled and waved upward thumbs when we walked past.
"I love to see you walking," some would say.
My mom smiled back or, if she wore a mask, waved both hands in appreciation of the comment. Saying something in response was often impossible since we rolled a chemo pole that sounded like a dying scooter engine. My mom strangely insisted on not pushing her own pole, so walking with her and her pole felt like walking a pet.
"I will take Mom for a walk," I would tell my dad, "as soon as she finishes eating."
She never minded having someone else set the pace for a walk, but she shot furtive glances over her mask when I settled into my Southern strut. My sister delivered the desired pace, so she took the pole when the three of us walked together. I would space out, taking in the floral paintings and latex glove dispensers, only to find that I had fallen behind four paces and must execute an awkward trot to avoid looking like an exercising patient myself. I was the unleashed dog, and they were the humans.
And so it went for three treatments. I liked to ask my mom how far she had walked in the morning and afternoon if I did not see her until the evening. She always knew the distance down to the tenth of a mile because 10 laps were equal to one mile. This was an impressive amount of math for my mom, who was an English teacher 31 years ago. I laughed when I discovered that she counted her miles by counting to five laps twice.
"Why not count to 10 instead?" I asked.
"I like to count to five twice," she said, answering my question in her typical, unsatisfying way.
Last week I found a stopwatch application on my new iPhone. Previous to this realization, my mom could only measure her walking with distance. Now I gave her the opportunity to calibrate her strength: unseemly speed.
Her eyes sparkled with this new dimension. Curious and slightly embarrassed, I walked into the hall with her and my toy. This time we were without my sister and the pole. We made good time on the first lap until we crossed the middle of the figure-eight the second time. She turned the wrong way.
"Oh, shoot," she said. "That's gonna cost us."
First lap: 2:29.3
"That's pretty good," I said without any basis for the statement. "I thought it would be at least three minutes."
My mom said nothing but lengthened her stride. I smiled and hurried to a door to open it for her. We rounded two more corners and came to a second set of closed double doors that required a punch to a handicap button for opening. We waited for the doors to separate, and I sensed my mom's impatience. After another turned corner we found a slow-rolling bed and two nurses who were unaware of our time trial. We walked politely behind the operation until they turned for the lobby. After a few more corners, daylight.
"The straightaway is clear," she said, giggling to herself and loosening her focus on time.
Second lap: 2:33.9
"Really?" she asked. She walked faster. This time I ran ahead to the troublesome double doors so she could walk through without having to wait. She liked that.
Third lap: 2:24.0
Fourth lap: 2:10.1
Fifth lap: 2:03.9
I worried that my mom thought the object of lap times was to make each lap faster than the preceding ones, a possibility that gave us the embarrassing appearance of neurological patients in the wrong ward and the startling reality of certain cardiac arrest. I learned to dread the last turn, which led to a short stretch of hall occupied by two patient families and a clear sight line to the lap marker. She almost jogged to the marker while I abashedly punched the lap button a dozen feet behind her and whispered the time.
"Sixth lap was 2:06.7."
Two of the family members caught on to our game and gave me the eye. I wore a guise of confidence but feared they would report us to the nurse's station.
My mom is in remission, and I'm clocking her laps, I thought. Deal with it. I really hoped the next lap would be slower, but instead we nearly jogged around the ward like doctors responding to a code blue. If we had been attached to a pole, the wheels would have rattled off at the end of the seventh lap. Her hospital gown flowed behind her like she was a model in a wind tunnel.
Seventh lap: 1:58.1
My mom's feet got lazy on the eighth. She stubbed her Crocs into the tile floor a few times and pitched forward with slight gasps of air. Each time she caught herself and continued forward with less, but still embarrassing, speed.
Eighth lap: 2:02.0
Ninth lap: 2:09.1
I really could not take anymore and considered sitting by the lap marker like a high school track coach while she sped around the hall. She attracted attention, but I doubt she knew it. I convinced her to stop just before the mile mark. I knew she could hang her hat on her pace if not her distance.
"You burned up the homestretches," I said when we walked back into her room. "You nearly disappeared around the last corner every time to get a fast lap."
"No," she said, correcting me. "You have to walk fast all the time."
I felt untypically satisfied.
My mom walked before for the health of it, but she stopped a few years ago. Of course she had an excellent reason to start again, so we walked the figure-eight hematology inpatient ward for half-hour segments. The nurses smiled and waved upward thumbs when we walked past.
"I love to see you walking," some would say.
My mom smiled back or, if she wore a mask, waved both hands in appreciation of the comment. Saying something in response was often impossible since we rolled a chemo pole that sounded like a dying scooter engine. My mom strangely insisted on not pushing her own pole, so walking with her and her pole felt like walking a pet.
"I will take Mom for a walk," I would tell my dad, "as soon as she finishes eating."
She never minded having someone else set the pace for a walk, but she shot furtive glances over her mask when I settled into my Southern strut. My sister delivered the desired pace, so she took the pole when the three of us walked together. I would space out, taking in the floral paintings and latex glove dispensers, only to find that I had fallen behind four paces and must execute an awkward trot to avoid looking like an exercising patient myself. I was the unleashed dog, and they were the humans.
And so it went for three treatments. I liked to ask my mom how far she had walked in the morning and afternoon if I did not see her until the evening. She always knew the distance down to the tenth of a mile because 10 laps were equal to one mile. This was an impressive amount of math for my mom, who was an English teacher 31 years ago. I laughed when I discovered that she counted her miles by counting to five laps twice.
"Why not count to 10 instead?" I asked.
"I like to count to five twice," she said, answering my question in her typical, unsatisfying way.
Last week I found a stopwatch application on my new iPhone. Previous to this realization, my mom could only measure her walking with distance. Now I gave her the opportunity to calibrate her strength: unseemly speed.
Her eyes sparkled with this new dimension. Curious and slightly embarrassed, I walked into the hall with her and my toy. This time we were without my sister and the pole. We made good time on the first lap until we crossed the middle of the figure-eight the second time. She turned the wrong way.
"Oh, shoot," she said. "That's gonna cost us."
First lap: 2:29.3
"That's pretty good," I said without any basis for the statement. "I thought it would be at least three minutes."
My mom said nothing but lengthened her stride. I smiled and hurried to a door to open it for her. We rounded two more corners and came to a second set of closed double doors that required a punch to a handicap button for opening. We waited for the doors to separate, and I sensed my mom's impatience. After another turned corner we found a slow-rolling bed and two nurses who were unaware of our time trial. We walked politely behind the operation until they turned for the lobby. After a few more corners, daylight.
"The straightaway is clear," she said, giggling to herself and loosening her focus on time.
Second lap: 2:33.9
"Really?" she asked. She walked faster. This time I ran ahead to the troublesome double doors so she could walk through without having to wait. She liked that.
Third lap: 2:24.0
Fourth lap: 2:10.1
Fifth lap: 2:03.9
I worried that my mom thought the object of lap times was to make each lap faster than the preceding ones, a possibility that gave us the embarrassing appearance of neurological patients in the wrong ward and the startling reality of certain cardiac arrest. I learned to dread the last turn, which led to a short stretch of hall occupied by two patient families and a clear sight line to the lap marker. She almost jogged to the marker while I abashedly punched the lap button a dozen feet behind her and whispered the time.
"Sixth lap was 2:06.7."
Two of the family members caught on to our game and gave me the eye. I wore a guise of confidence but feared they would report us to the nurse's station.
My mom is in remission, and I'm clocking her laps, I thought. Deal with it. I really hoped the next lap would be slower, but instead we nearly jogged around the ward like doctors responding to a code blue. If we had been attached to a pole, the wheels would have rattled off at the end of the seventh lap. Her hospital gown flowed behind her like she was a model in a wind tunnel.
Seventh lap: 1:58.1
My mom's feet got lazy on the eighth. She stubbed her Crocs into the tile floor a few times and pitched forward with slight gasps of air. Each time she caught herself and continued forward with less, but still embarrassing, speed.
Eighth lap: 2:02.0
Ninth lap: 2:09.1
I really could not take anymore and considered sitting by the lap marker like a high school track coach while she sped around the hall. She attracted attention, but I doubt she knew it. I convinced her to stop just before the mile mark. I knew she could hang her hat on her pace if not her distance.
"You burned up the homestretches," I said when we walked back into her room. "You nearly disappeared around the last corner every time to get a fast lap."
"No," she said, correcting me. "You have to walk fast all the time."
I felt untypically satisfied.
Saturday, August 7, 2010
Undone
Recently I noticed that sitting in my car was uncomfortable. I felt a bit better standing up or reclining in a chair, but sitting upright in my car bothered my torso in a startling way. Not a stranger to medical mishaps, I was only a bit worried until one afternoon when I heard a sound after my butt hit the seat.
Snap.
The tightness in my torso disappeared. I lifted my shirt and saw what relieved and despaired me: two halves of an open button clasp splayed in different directions, held together by a zipper that slowly descended as I leaned forward. My gut was free at last.
My dependable metabolism is slipping. Since that moment I have worn my 13-year-old cargo shorts with the fly button undone. The shorts feel like elastic forgiveness. I feel better in the simplest of ways.
The one drawback is that I have a tendency to scratch my stomach and chest, so my method reveals itself. I obviously love self deprecating humor, but the news sounds different when I am not the one reporting.
"Your button is undone," someone said.
"I know," I responded. "I like it like that." Embrace it, I thought. If you think it's sexy, then it's sexy. Own it. Love it. Scratch it. I used to say I wanted this to happen because I thought it would not. It happened; I do not like it. But I think I do not like it because I did not write about it before other people told me about it.
I planned to run a bit in the cool mornings, but I cannot wake up before 10. Right now I have no plans at 8:45 on a Saturday night, but I do have a recently revived iPod, a workout playlist and a zipper that hangs on like two lovebirds twirling each other in an open pasture.
Let's go.
Snap.
The tightness in my torso disappeared. I lifted my shirt and saw what relieved and despaired me: two halves of an open button clasp splayed in different directions, held together by a zipper that slowly descended as I leaned forward. My gut was free at last.
My dependable metabolism is slipping. Since that moment I have worn my 13-year-old cargo shorts with the fly button undone. The shorts feel like elastic forgiveness. I feel better in the simplest of ways.
The one drawback is that I have a tendency to scratch my stomach and chest, so my method reveals itself. I obviously love self deprecating humor, but the news sounds different when I am not the one reporting.
"Your button is undone," someone said.
"I know," I responded. "I like it like that." Embrace it, I thought. If you think it's sexy, then it's sexy. Own it. Love it. Scratch it. I used to say I wanted this to happen because I thought it would not. It happened; I do not like it. But I think I do not like it because I did not write about it before other people told me about it.
I planned to run a bit in the cool mornings, but I cannot wake up before 10. Right now I have no plans at 8:45 on a Saturday night, but I do have a recently revived iPod, a workout playlist and a zipper that hangs on like two lovebirds twirling each other in an open pasture.
Let's go.
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Cookie
If you read my previous posts, you know that my mom has leukemia and my sister, Jaylyn, is living with us in Chapel Hill. This necessary proximity reminds us of the traits we share and, of course, the ones we do not. We lived together for more than a dozen years, but drifting into my mid 20s among college buddies a region away from home clouded my memory.
The three of us were eating lunch at an expensive place that would not give this little piggy enough roast beef. They both love places like that, but I like my beef sandwiches cheap and thick.
"Do you want to get some dessert?" my mom asked me.
"Mom, I never eat dessert," I said. "The main course is my dessert."
"You like cookies," she said. She was right. She remembered that I liked cookies when I did not. I went to the counter to get a cookie and brought it back.
"Cookies are the best dessert," I said. My mom and sister both nodded in unison. "Besides having amazing texture and flavor, they are the easiest dessert to eat. All you need to do is pick one up and take a bite. A cookie is simple."
My mom nodded, picked up her plastic utensils and strained to knife the cookie into two unequal pieces.
The three of us were eating lunch at an expensive place that would not give this little piggy enough roast beef. They both love places like that, but I like my beef sandwiches cheap and thick.
"Do you want to get some dessert?" my mom asked me.
"Mom, I never eat dessert," I said. "The main course is my dessert."
"You like cookies," she said. She was right. She remembered that I liked cookies when I did not. I went to the counter to get a cookie and brought it back.
"Cookies are the best dessert," I said. My mom and sister both nodded in unison. "Besides having amazing texture and flavor, they are the easiest dessert to eat. All you need to do is pick one up and take a bite. A cookie is simple."
My mom nodded, picked up her plastic utensils and strained to knife the cookie into two unequal pieces.
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Good morning
On her birthday, my aunt called my mom to tell her she has a match. I am ever so tempted to break with journalistic discipline and use an exclamation point.
!
!
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
My mom and the Be The Match Registry
This post is an unpaid endorsement for the Be The Match Registry, a nonprofit organization that matches willing, unrelated stem cell donors with patients who need a life-saving transplant. To become a registry member or donate to the cause, visit www.bethematch.org.
My mom was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia at the end of May. I am happy to say that she is in complete remission and finished her first round of consolidation chemotherapy Saturday. Consolidation is a type of chemo given to patients who are in complete remission after receiving induction chemotherapy. You can think of consolidation chemo as a way of kicking the cancer when it is down.
She has handled her treatment well, and her body has responded in the best ways possible. Her immune system will be weak after treatments and strong after recoveries, but her spirits are consistently high. She is often out and about in Chapel Hill and Durham.
My mom's cytogenetic profile signaled doctors that she is at a high risk for relapse, so getting an allogeneic stem cell transplant is her best chance for a cure. Allogeneic means that the transplant will come from another person. Stem cells are cells that produce all types of blood cells.
Allogeneic transplant donors can be a related family member or an unrelated donor. Doctors examine cheek cell swabs from the patient and prospective donors to determine the best match. My family is hoping that my mom's sister, Martha, will be a good match for my mom. Doctors say that a sibling will match 25 percent of the time. Parent and child matches are even less common.
If Martha does not match, the hospital will match my mom with the best-fit donor from the National Marrow Donor Program's Be The Match Registry, a list of people who have pledged to donate bone marrow or stem cells to any patient in need of a transplant. Doctors told us that my mom will more than likely find a suitable donor in the registry because she is white. The registry encourages anyone to join because a larger pool of donors will produce better matches for all patients, but they also urgently need donors who are black, American Indian, Asian, Pacific, Hispanic and of multiple races.
The NMDP has facilitated nearly 40,000 transplants worldwide. Seventy percent of all allogeneic transplant patients do not match with a family member and need an unrelated donor match. The chance that two random individuals are a suitable match is one in 20,000. Many donors are not only the best match for a patient; they are the only match on the registry of 12 million people.
My sister and I joined the registry online and are letting our friends know about it. Be The Match sent us cheek swabs and information, and we swabbed and sent them back. The donor process is virtually painless and completely free. Be The Match reimburses all travel and related costs for all donors. Most people we know in the registry have never been called to donate but pledge to do so when a patient needs them.
Doctors draw donations through a marrow harvest or a peripheral blood stem cell donation depending on the patient's needs. You are probably most familiar with a marrow harvest, which is actually the least common donation method. It is a surgical, out-patient procedure in which doctors use anesthesia and needles to withdraw liquid marrow from the pelvic bone. My mom is terrified of needles and had several bone marrow biopsies; she said they were easy. She gets goofy drugs for a few hours, but she never experienced pain. She prefers a marrow harvest to a needle prick without anesthesia.
PBSC donations are much more common. For five days before the donation, the donor receives daily injections of a drug that increases blood-forming stem cells in the bloodstream. On the fifth day, the donor's blood is removed through a needle in one arm and passed through a machine that separates out the stem cells. The remaining blood is returned to the donor through the other arm. The process is similar to donating platelets. Donors may experience a headache or bone or muscle aches before the collection.
Deciding to join the registry is a very personal decision. I did not know I had the opportunity to be someone's living best chance at life before my mom got sick; I thought only family members could donate. I want you to know that you could be someone's best chance if you decide to join the registry. Receiving a transplant is a transplant patient's best or only hope for a cure.
Please ask me questions if you have any even though you can probably get all your answers at www.bethematch.org. Joining the registry is quick and easy. The site also accepts donations that help to aid families with uninsured transplant costs, fully reimburse donors, fund medical research and add donors to the registry.
People tell me that they think about and pray for my family often. I always think about them in return whenever we get good news. I hope our next good news will be that my mom has a match.
My mom was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia at the end of May. I am happy to say that she is in complete remission and finished her first round of consolidation chemotherapy Saturday. Consolidation is a type of chemo given to patients who are in complete remission after receiving induction chemotherapy. You can think of consolidation chemo as a way of kicking the cancer when it is down.
She has handled her treatment well, and her body has responded in the best ways possible. Her immune system will be weak after treatments and strong after recoveries, but her spirits are consistently high. She is often out and about in Chapel Hill and Durham.
My mom's cytogenetic profile signaled doctors that she is at a high risk for relapse, so getting an allogeneic stem cell transplant is her best chance for a cure. Allogeneic means that the transplant will come from another person. Stem cells are cells that produce all types of blood cells.
Allogeneic transplant donors can be a related family member or an unrelated donor. Doctors examine cheek cell swabs from the patient and prospective donors to determine the best match. My family is hoping that my mom's sister, Martha, will be a good match for my mom. Doctors say that a sibling will match 25 percent of the time. Parent and child matches are even less common.
If Martha does not match, the hospital will match my mom with the best-fit donor from the National Marrow Donor Program's Be The Match Registry, a list of people who have pledged to donate bone marrow or stem cells to any patient in need of a transplant. Doctors told us that my mom will more than likely find a suitable donor in the registry because she is white. The registry encourages anyone to join because a larger pool of donors will produce better matches for all patients, but they also urgently need donors who are black, American Indian, Asian, Pacific, Hispanic and of multiple races.
The NMDP has facilitated nearly 40,000 transplants worldwide. Seventy percent of all allogeneic transplant patients do not match with a family member and need an unrelated donor match. The chance that two random individuals are a suitable match is one in 20,000. Many donors are not only the best match for a patient; they are the only match on the registry of 12 million people.
My sister and I joined the registry online and are letting our friends know about it. Be The Match sent us cheek swabs and information, and we swabbed and sent them back. The donor process is virtually painless and completely free. Be The Match reimburses all travel and related costs for all donors. Most people we know in the registry have never been called to donate but pledge to do so when a patient needs them.
Doctors draw donations through a marrow harvest or a peripheral blood stem cell donation depending on the patient's needs. You are probably most familiar with a marrow harvest, which is actually the least common donation method. It is a surgical, out-patient procedure in which doctors use anesthesia and needles to withdraw liquid marrow from the pelvic bone. My mom is terrified of needles and had several bone marrow biopsies; she said they were easy. She gets goofy drugs for a few hours, but she never experienced pain. She prefers a marrow harvest to a needle prick without anesthesia.
PBSC donations are much more common. For five days before the donation, the donor receives daily injections of a drug that increases blood-forming stem cells in the bloodstream. On the fifth day, the donor's blood is removed through a needle in one arm and passed through a machine that separates out the stem cells. The remaining blood is returned to the donor through the other arm. The process is similar to donating platelets. Donors may experience a headache or bone or muscle aches before the collection.
Deciding to join the registry is a very personal decision. I did not know I had the opportunity to be someone's living best chance at life before my mom got sick; I thought only family members could donate. I want you to know that you could be someone's best chance if you decide to join the registry. Receiving a transplant is a transplant patient's best or only hope for a cure.
Please ask me questions if you have any even though you can probably get all your answers at www.bethematch.org. Joining the registry is quick and easy. The site also accepts donations that help to aid families with uninsured transplant costs, fully reimburse donors, fund medical research and add donors to the registry.
People tell me that they think about and pray for my family often. I always think about them in return whenever we get good news. I hope our next good news will be that my mom has a match.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Company
As a teacher who refused to write about his kids or job, I found that my own life did not give me as much to write about as it used to. Recently life gave me plenty to write about, but I do not want to write about it. I mean, I could. I might some day. But I do not think I will write anything about it today.
I will say that life is best experienced with other people. That sounds obvious, but men like the lone cowboy fantasy. John Wayne claimed to not need anything except his horse and a beer but allegedly died with 40 pounds of fecal matter in his intestines. The man was stressed out.
You reach a point in your 20s when making friends is not as easy as sitting next to someone new in class. If you are educated, then your friends probably have jobs and cannot play catch with you at the park. So you have at least some moments of solitude that do not seem entirely natural. Some stew. Some date. Others embrace the solitude as cowboys and cowgirls should.
I remember going out by myself for the first time. I was incredibly nervous. A game was on television, so I thought I would look normal sitting at the bar and watching. Of course the game ended as soon as I got through the door. Not knowing how to behave, I walked to the bar without bending my knees and elbows to embrace the cowboy inside, a newly discovered paraplegic infant underneath an imaginary Stetson. Or maybe I subconsciously felt all that fecal matter and knew that I would fall to the floor if I bent my knees. I just do not know.
"A grown, nondisabled man just walked in like a five month old," you might have whispered to your friend, not knowing it was me because you were afraid to look twice.
"What do babies walk like?" he would have asked.
"Never mind," you would have said. "Don't look. He is hideous."
The truth is that I did not have fun that night until my girlfriend came, and I doubt it had anything to do with my entrance. Not even drinking was fun to do by myself. My friends tell me that drinking by yourself is surely a bad sign. I think drinking by yourself and enjoying it is a bad sign. But who would enjoy that? Sometimes you just have to do it even though you do not enjoy it. That, to me, is a good sign.
That is all I have to say right now about the company of other people.
I will say that life is best experienced with other people. That sounds obvious, but men like the lone cowboy fantasy. John Wayne claimed to not need anything except his horse and a beer but allegedly died with 40 pounds of fecal matter in his intestines. The man was stressed out.
You reach a point in your 20s when making friends is not as easy as sitting next to someone new in class. If you are educated, then your friends probably have jobs and cannot play catch with you at the park. So you have at least some moments of solitude that do not seem entirely natural. Some stew. Some date. Others embrace the solitude as cowboys and cowgirls should.
I remember going out by myself for the first time. I was incredibly nervous. A game was on television, so I thought I would look normal sitting at the bar and watching. Of course the game ended as soon as I got through the door. Not knowing how to behave, I walked to the bar without bending my knees and elbows to embrace the cowboy inside, a newly discovered paraplegic infant underneath an imaginary Stetson. Or maybe I subconsciously felt all that fecal matter and knew that I would fall to the floor if I bent my knees. I just do not know.
"A grown, nondisabled man just walked in like a five month old," you might have whispered to your friend, not knowing it was me because you were afraid to look twice.
"What do babies walk like?" he would have asked.
"Never mind," you would have said. "Don't look. He is hideous."
The truth is that I did not have fun that night until my girlfriend came, and I doubt it had anything to do with my entrance. Not even drinking was fun to do by myself. My friends tell me that drinking by yourself is surely a bad sign. I think drinking by yourself and enjoying it is a bad sign. But who would enjoy that? Sometimes you just have to do it even though you do not enjoy it. That, to me, is a good sign.
That is all I have to say right now about the company of other people.
Monday, May 10, 2010
Competitor
A few weeks ago I lost an online chess game to one of those guys who reminded me why so few people play chess. I told him that chess teaches a lot but did not teach him manners. He did not like that.
"Shut up and play me again," he typed. I tried as hard as I could to make him poop his pants but failed in the last second. I know conversing with this guy was pathetic, but I could not help myself. That poor bloke had not learned by his 20s or 30s what I learned when I was 4. I figure I earned some sort of moral credit to spend on myself since I lost 20 minutes of my life interacting with the guy.
I started to think about how I approach different types of competition. I coached junior varsity baseball for two years and took a laid back approach to the game. The head coach, Roddy, contrasted my style. He understood how to prepare boys to play like men every day. I marveled at the terrific lies he told the players.
"I hate Carrboro more than any other team," he said with his signature composed intensity. "We will not lose to Carrboro tomorrow." Carrboro is a town of granola eating, bike riding, modestly overachieving hippies. I might have liked Carrboro's team even more than our own if I got to know them, but I kept my mouth shut. Twenty-four hours after Roddy's pep talk, our team notched a 30-run win in three innings after we declared our own run rule. Nobody hated Carrboro anymore, and our kids forgot that their coach said he did. Kids are funny.
I would be a terrible head coach because I would tell the kids the truth that I wanted them to play hard all the time regardless of the opponent. Sometimes I did not even know who the opponent was until the middle of the first. Coaching with Roddy showed me that saying what was on my mind was not nearly as important as saying what was not on the team's mind. I never had anything on my mind anyway.
To me, individual competition is more personal than being part of a team. I cannot blame anyone but myself nor credit anyone but my opponent when I lose a chess or disc golf match. I am addicted to that challenge. The one exception to this rule is doubles table tennis, which became a problem for me at Miami University. I learned to never upset a teammate with a paddle in his hand. I will tell those stories some other time.
One of the algebra teachers in my department will leave this summer, so the rest of us will take his classes in the fall. When we heard the news at our daily department lunch, I turned to Jennifer, the other algebra teacher.
"Paper-rock-scissors for the algebra class," I said instinctively.
"How about we run a triathlon instead?" she asked with imposing confidence. Jennifer once qualified for the Hawaii Ironman.
"Nah," I said.
"Why don't you two have a peanut butter and jelly eating contest?" another colleague suggested. The department convinced me that Jennifer would beat me at anything except a sandwich eating contest or paper-rock-scissors, in which I figured to be a 40-60 dog. My instincts were almost right.
"How about a pull-up contest?" Jennifer asked. The three passed minutes had not changed my mind about a legitimate physical challenge with a world-class athlete.
"I'll bet you can't do 10," my friend Seth said. Now that I could not let slide. I started to prep for an after school date with the high school weight room by pounding two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Protein, sugar and a bit of water, I thought, was all I needed to beat an iron bar that was not a triathlete.
I was wrong. Once I got to three, I knew that 10 was impossible. My penalties were a sore abdomen and Thursday departmental tutoring for the rest of the semester. I will live.
"Shut up and play me again," he typed. I tried as hard as I could to make him poop his pants but failed in the last second. I know conversing with this guy was pathetic, but I could not help myself. That poor bloke had not learned by his 20s or 30s what I learned when I was 4. I figure I earned some sort of moral credit to spend on myself since I lost 20 minutes of my life interacting with the guy.
I started to think about how I approach different types of competition. I coached junior varsity baseball for two years and took a laid back approach to the game. The head coach, Roddy, contrasted my style. He understood how to prepare boys to play like men every day. I marveled at the terrific lies he told the players.
"I hate Carrboro more than any other team," he said with his signature composed intensity. "We will not lose to Carrboro tomorrow." Carrboro is a town of granola eating, bike riding, modestly overachieving hippies. I might have liked Carrboro's team even more than our own if I got to know them, but I kept my mouth shut. Twenty-four hours after Roddy's pep talk, our team notched a 30-run win in three innings after we declared our own run rule. Nobody hated Carrboro anymore, and our kids forgot that their coach said he did. Kids are funny.
I would be a terrible head coach because I would tell the kids the truth that I wanted them to play hard all the time regardless of the opponent. Sometimes I did not even know who the opponent was until the middle of the first. Coaching with Roddy showed me that saying what was on my mind was not nearly as important as saying what was not on the team's mind. I never had anything on my mind anyway.
To me, individual competition is more personal than being part of a team. I cannot blame anyone but myself nor credit anyone but my opponent when I lose a chess or disc golf match. I am addicted to that challenge. The one exception to this rule is doubles table tennis, which became a problem for me at Miami University. I learned to never upset a teammate with a paddle in his hand. I will tell those stories some other time.
One of the algebra teachers in my department will leave this summer, so the rest of us will take his classes in the fall. When we heard the news at our daily department lunch, I turned to Jennifer, the other algebra teacher.
"Paper-rock-scissors for the algebra class," I said instinctively.
"How about we run a triathlon instead?" she asked with imposing confidence. Jennifer once qualified for the Hawaii Ironman.
"Nah," I said.
"Why don't you two have a peanut butter and jelly eating contest?" another colleague suggested. The department convinced me that Jennifer would beat me at anything except a sandwich eating contest or paper-rock-scissors, in which I figured to be a 40-60 dog. My instincts were almost right.
"How about a pull-up contest?" Jennifer asked. The three passed minutes had not changed my mind about a legitimate physical challenge with a world-class athlete.
"I'll bet you can't do 10," my friend Seth said. Now that I could not let slide. I started to prep for an after school date with the high school weight room by pounding two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Protein, sugar and a bit of water, I thought, was all I needed to beat an iron bar that was not a triathlete.
I was wrong. Once I got to three, I knew that 10 was impossible. My penalties were a sore abdomen and Thursday departmental tutoring for the rest of the semester. I will live.
Thursday, April 8, 2010
Metro man
Today I woke up at 1 p.m., an early spring break start, and sleepily wandered to my garage for a hair trim. I laid out the newspaper, oiled the blades and clipped on the guard. I had grown proud of my thrifty method. Only a few years ago I paid top dollar, almost $15, to have old men run their own clippers through my hair for a few minutes. I figured going to the barber was a stupid expenditure, so I went to a Charlotte Wal-Mart to buy the cheapest trimming set I could find.
The thrift excited me. I thought I would trim outside, shirtless, in all sorts of conditions: hot, cold, raining, snowing, hailing. This kind of thing, foregoing personal comfort to save a few bucks that did not need saving, was what older men like my father did. I giddily anticipated losing my good sense.
Just as I was about to do the deed this morning, I dropped the trimmer on the cement floor. My favorite guard, the 1/8 inch that kept me militantly short and clean for years, broke. I briefly considered the 1/4 inch until thoughts of butt cuts and $100 scalp massages entered my mind. I could spin out of control. These things happened to people like John Edwards and Zack Morris.
I pondered my options and called Conair customer service. Richard, possibly Richard Simmons, answered the phone. I explained my problem while Richard fished through the database to see whether Conair had this part in stock. They didn't.
"Honey baby, I'll send you a 1/8 inch from another model," he said, "but I ain't gonna tease you. It might not fit. You'd better get your ass to a beauty store to get a one-size-fits-all guide." Conair's warehouse seemed disorganized, but their staff was sincere.
I called Sally Beauty Supply. The lady told me she had what I wanted. I went and got it. It was between the nail polish and hair extensions. They only had 1/16 inch in stock. I was sold.
The thrift excited me. I thought I would trim outside, shirtless, in all sorts of conditions: hot, cold, raining, snowing, hailing. This kind of thing, foregoing personal comfort to save a few bucks that did not need saving, was what older men like my father did. I giddily anticipated losing my good sense.
Just as I was about to do the deed this morning, I dropped the trimmer on the cement floor. My favorite guard, the 1/8 inch that kept me militantly short and clean for years, broke. I briefly considered the 1/4 inch until thoughts of butt cuts and $100 scalp massages entered my mind. I could spin out of control. These things happened to people like John Edwards and Zack Morris.
I pondered my options and called Conair customer service. Richard, possibly Richard Simmons, answered the phone. I explained my problem while Richard fished through the database to see whether Conair had this part in stock. They didn't.
"Honey baby, I'll send you a 1/8 inch from another model," he said, "but I ain't gonna tease you. It might not fit. You'd better get your ass to a beauty store to get a one-size-fits-all guide." Conair's warehouse seemed disorganized, but their staff was sincere.
I called Sally Beauty Supply. The lady told me she had what I wanted. I went and got it. It was between the nail polish and hair extensions. They only had 1/16 inch in stock. I was sold.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Making sense of nonsense
Now the writing will flow out of me. Coming back after the chess obsession was difficult. I did not feel like I was on my game for my last post but now, after those trust fund whiners won the NCAA tournament, my writing will flow like my words flowed at Linda's not one hour ago.
First of all, before I even say a word about the children down the street, let me say that I love Carolina fans. None of my friends wanted to watch the game tonight, and I understand that sentiment. I did not watch the first half, but I could not stay away after finding out that Butler, bless their hearts, trailed by one at intermission. So I saddled up at Linda's and met my two new best friends, one to my left and one to my right. I was awfully proud of the one to my right, a Master of Arts candidate who cheered like a Butler undergraduate while he mastered the phonetics of vocal performance during commercial breaks. I ordered my drinks from Laura Taylor, a woman so named for the Tar Heel who invented the football sack. The other patrons were rowdy and supportive. We were in the Carolina boat together.
I wish I did not care who won tonight's game. I think I would be a better person if I was over it before it was over. I thought I was over it after Saturday night, but I had not yet remembered Duke's obvious shortcomings to lessen the venomous flames in my stomach. Tonight I remembered those shortcomings.
One such shortcoming surfaces in a story about the one Duke friend I ever had. Carolina lost in the ACC tournament in 2009, and this friend sent me a Facebook message that said "sorry how it ended for your team." Of course, this was a petulant lie. He was not sorry. His sarcasm resembled a disrespectful but intelligent 6-year-old because that is par for the course at Duke University. Carolina won the national championship a month later. I said not a word to him. I never befriended another Duke child. I learned my lesson.
I might be wallowing now; I understand this. But I sense some real rational thinking underneath the anger. Carolina has five championships. Duke has fewer. Carolina has a better recruiting class for next season and might win by 33 points in both games. Harrison Barnes, the most skilled and intelligent recruit in his class, selected Carolina after Duke chased him for three years. Carolina wins with class for reasons that I cannot briefly explain to those of you who do not know the Carolina way. Let's just say that Carolina invented all the great things about basketball: pointing to the passer, standing up for substitutions, etc. A guy in Kansas thought of putting a ball in a hole in the air after a Scottish guy did it on the ground, but we did all the rest. Basketball would not be basketball if it were not for Carolina, Dean Smith and Roy Williams. Everyone thanks us for these contributions except Duke. Teaching manners is one challenge of education.
My landlord, a die-hard Carolina fan, told me that Duke was a good fit for some people. I suppose it is a good idea to separate Duke people from society. Carolina would not be Carolina if Duke did not exist because some of them would go here. Duke cleans up Carolina's classrooms so that we may think freely and humbly and impact society through education, medicine, law, journalism and public policy. Duke alumni compete with each other to make the most money while they stare at computers and self portraits.
In this sense Duke's victory is sort of like aliens occupying the earth. Of course it sucks, but we cannot be upset with them in a human way. They do not have the same goals or values as compassionate people, so the best we can do is oust them to restore order for ourselves.
Order is around the corner, and Duke fans know it. They suffered through five years of Carolina dominance and wondered if they would be relevant again. They are relevant right now, but it will all be over soon. Their fate is waiting for them eight miles away.
First of all, before I even say a word about the children down the street, let me say that I love Carolina fans. None of my friends wanted to watch the game tonight, and I understand that sentiment. I did not watch the first half, but I could not stay away after finding out that Butler, bless their hearts, trailed by one at intermission. So I saddled up at Linda's and met my two new best friends, one to my left and one to my right. I was awfully proud of the one to my right, a Master of Arts candidate who cheered like a Butler undergraduate while he mastered the phonetics of vocal performance during commercial breaks. I ordered my drinks from Laura Taylor, a woman so named for the Tar Heel who invented the football sack. The other patrons were rowdy and supportive. We were in the Carolina boat together.
I wish I did not care who won tonight's game. I think I would be a better person if I was over it before it was over. I thought I was over it after Saturday night, but I had not yet remembered Duke's obvious shortcomings to lessen the venomous flames in my stomach. Tonight I remembered those shortcomings.
One such shortcoming surfaces in a story about the one Duke friend I ever had. Carolina lost in the ACC tournament in 2009, and this friend sent me a Facebook message that said "sorry how it ended for your team." Of course, this was a petulant lie. He was not sorry. His sarcasm resembled a disrespectful but intelligent 6-year-old because that is par for the course at Duke University. Carolina won the national championship a month later. I said not a word to him. I never befriended another Duke child. I learned my lesson.
I might be wallowing now; I understand this. But I sense some real rational thinking underneath the anger. Carolina has five championships. Duke has fewer. Carolina has a better recruiting class for next season and might win by 33 points in both games. Harrison Barnes, the most skilled and intelligent recruit in his class, selected Carolina after Duke chased him for three years. Carolina wins with class for reasons that I cannot briefly explain to those of you who do not know the Carolina way. Let's just say that Carolina invented all the great things about basketball: pointing to the passer, standing up for substitutions, etc. A guy in Kansas thought of putting a ball in a hole in the air after a Scottish guy did it on the ground, but we did all the rest. Basketball would not be basketball if it were not for Carolina, Dean Smith and Roy Williams. Everyone thanks us for these contributions except Duke. Teaching manners is one challenge of education.
My landlord, a die-hard Carolina fan, told me that Duke was a good fit for some people. I suppose it is a good idea to separate Duke people from society. Carolina would not be Carolina if Duke did not exist because some of them would go here. Duke cleans up Carolina's classrooms so that we may think freely and humbly and impact society through education, medicine, law, journalism and public policy. Duke alumni compete with each other to make the most money while they stare at computers and self portraits.
In this sense Duke's victory is sort of like aliens occupying the earth. Of course it sucks, but we cannot be upset with them in a human way. They do not have the same goals or values as compassionate people, so the best we can do is oust them to restore order for ourselves.
Order is around the corner, and Duke fans know it. They suffered through five years of Carolina dominance and wondered if they would be relevant again. They are relevant right now, but it will all be over soon. Their fate is waiting for them eight miles away.
Saturday, April 3, 2010
Patzer
patzer: a casual, amateurish chess player.
I have played 450 online chess games since Christmas. You might think I made up that number, but my account at chess.com says it is true. If you pair those games with the dozen or so over-the-board games I coerced my friends to enjoy, you can see that I play a lot of chess. I average five games per day.
This hobby, like poker, is severely addicting. Chess.com allows me to play any level of player in any type of timed game at any moment. It's just so easy to start a game. The site also offers correspondence chess, so I can play multiple games at a time against old college friends and colleagues. If I am on the site but don't feel like playing, I can improve my game with learning tools like the tactics trainer, the chess mentor and the daily puzzle. And through all of this, I see my rating rise and fall with victories and defeats. Talk about incentive.
My friend Ryan recently expressed interest, so I gave him a playable board for Christmas. He politely said thanks without understanding he had committed to my home invasions every week to play over-the-board blitz games. Those are the games I enjoy the most because he is a friend and I get to hear the beautiful cadence made famous in "Searching for Bobby Fischer": thump, smack, thump, smack.
Those healthy moments contrast with more frustrating ones. I sometimes lose concentration when online strangers talk me into checkmates. I always lose to talkers regardless of their ratings. One young fellow from California commented on the career listed in my profile and refused a rematch because he had to do his homework and get to bed on time. Ouch. I promptly made him my friend so I could play and lose to him a few more times.
I know I sound like a walking advertisement and have not written for a long time. Writing about chess might be the way back to my old hobbies, but I doubt I'll drop chess as long as that rating continues to climb. Maybe I won't be a patzer for long. I will close with a favorite quote and a reminder that even the best player in the world makes mistakes.
Play the opening by the book, the middle game like a magician, and the endgame like a machine.
~Unknown
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Long drive
I woke up two hours later than normal today because of an adverse-weather delay. I brushed my teeth, ate, worked a little and briefly showered with my new body wash, the pheromone-loaded kind that comes in an oil can. I ran out the door with a good thought: work.
I knew something besides my odor was wrong when I crossed the bridge over the Haw. North Carolina seemed more desolate than ever before. It could have been the lack of cars or the dismal topic on NPR or my foggy head.
It was the lack of cars. I pulled into an empty gravel lot and parked. My silenced phone contained the message: school was canceled. I refused to unceremoniously drive away, so I walked to the front entrance and pulled a locked door. Lowe's hardware was across the street, so I drove over and walked the wood-scented, concrete aisles. I remembered shopping with my dad when I was little. My only job was to push the cart, but I used to forget to look forward until the front end bounced off his Achilles tendon. Then I would ram his other one a few minutes later. I could not pay attention with all that wonderful hardware stacked up so high.
I wanted to call someone on my half-hour ride home to celebrate, so I called my colleague friend. He was still alive in the middle of the lonely morning. I felt better.
I knew something besides my odor was wrong when I crossed the bridge over the Haw. North Carolina seemed more desolate than ever before. It could have been the lack of cars or the dismal topic on NPR or my foggy head.
It was the lack of cars. I pulled into an empty gravel lot and parked. My silenced phone contained the message: school was canceled. I refused to unceremoniously drive away, so I walked to the front entrance and pulled a locked door. Lowe's hardware was across the street, so I drove over and walked the wood-scented, concrete aisles. I remembered shopping with my dad when I was little. My only job was to push the cart, but I used to forget to look forward until the front end bounced off his Achilles tendon. Then I would ram his other one a few minutes later. I could not pay attention with all that wonderful hardware stacked up so high.
I wanted to call someone on my half-hour ride home to celebrate, so I called my colleague friend. He was still alive in the middle of the lonely morning. I felt better.
Friday, January 29, 2010
Salinger
Reclusive author J.D. Salinger died yesterday at 91. If you know me a little bit, you know how I love "The Catcher in the Rye." Holden Caulfield has needed a hug for more than 50 years.
How strange it is to express sympathy for an adolescent in a novel. Less strange is that we hurt for Salinger, who let us know his elder self only as an uptight diary writer tucked away in the New Hampshire mountains. He appeared to be the logical conclusion of Holden's few wandering days. In the worst of ways, Salinger seemed to never grow up.
Reports of his life vary. They say that he wanted to control people and held the world in contempt. His daughter wrote that he said she should have an abortion because she had no right to be a mother. She also said he drank his own urine. All this is a far cry from what I know about Salinger. All I can think is that he was Holden.
I read "Catcher" a few years ago. The plot of the book did not matter to me. The real story happened before the narration began. His brother died years before. He messed up at school. He despised most of his peers. He was afraid to talk to girls. I could relate to less than half of his experiences, but I liked to listen to his voice. He was the most genuine narrator I ever read.
More than a decade earlier I had fallen in love with the film "Field of Dreams." The film was about Ray, a man who followed his conscience to a game of catch with his late father. Along the way he met Black Sox player Joe Jackson, retired ballplayer Archie Graham and Terence Mann, a frighteningly disgruntled ex-writer stuffed into a disheveled apartment in downtown Boston. Ray's conscience told him to take Mann to a Red Sox game, so he drove to Boston from his Iowa farm. Mann slammed the door in Ray's face and minutes later let him in to chase him with a crowbar.
In my adult life I strolled through a used bookstore in downtown Asheville and found a copy of the original novel, W.P. Kinsella's "Shoeless Joe." I was pleased to find that J.D. Salinger was the writer in the story. The film's director probably wanted to use Salinger as a character but could not. Salinger was famous for not wanting to be famous.
I forget how, but the film's Ray cooled Mann into offering him a cookie and, yes, going to the Sox game. Then the writer followed the dreamer to Minnesota to find the elderly Graham, who got his first and last career at bat as his younger self back in Iowa at the farm. Mann eventually disappeared into the Iowa corn to see the unknown. We never knew his purpose.
But not quite so goes Salinger. He never stirred us with a final, gripping monologue on America or youth or love like Mann did. He probably never offered anyone a cookie, and maybe nobody ever asked him for one. He went quietly because he wanted to. And here I am saying that I like the man. I know nothing about him except for the things he wanted me to know about him.
How strange it is to express sympathy for an adolescent in a novel. Less strange is that we hurt for Salinger, who let us know his elder self only as an uptight diary writer tucked away in the New Hampshire mountains. He appeared to be the logical conclusion of Holden's few wandering days. In the worst of ways, Salinger seemed to never grow up.
Reports of his life vary. They say that he wanted to control people and held the world in contempt. His daughter wrote that he said she should have an abortion because she had no right to be a mother. She also said he drank his own urine. All this is a far cry from what I know about Salinger. All I can think is that he was Holden.
I read "Catcher" a few years ago. The plot of the book did not matter to me. The real story happened before the narration began. His brother died years before. He messed up at school. He despised most of his peers. He was afraid to talk to girls. I could relate to less than half of his experiences, but I liked to listen to his voice. He was the most genuine narrator I ever read.
More than a decade earlier I had fallen in love with the film "Field of Dreams." The film was about Ray, a man who followed his conscience to a game of catch with his late father. Along the way he met Black Sox player Joe Jackson, retired ballplayer Archie Graham and Terence Mann, a frighteningly disgruntled ex-writer stuffed into a disheveled apartment in downtown Boston. Ray's conscience told him to take Mann to a Red Sox game, so he drove to Boston from his Iowa farm. Mann slammed the door in Ray's face and minutes later let him in to chase him with a crowbar.
In my adult life I strolled through a used bookstore in downtown Asheville and found a copy of the original novel, W.P. Kinsella's "Shoeless Joe." I was pleased to find that J.D. Salinger was the writer in the story. The film's director probably wanted to use Salinger as a character but could not. Salinger was famous for not wanting to be famous.
I forget how, but the film's Ray cooled Mann into offering him a cookie and, yes, going to the Sox game. Then the writer followed the dreamer to Minnesota to find the elderly Graham, who got his first and last career at bat as his younger self back in Iowa at the farm. Mann eventually disappeared into the Iowa corn to see the unknown. We never knew his purpose.
But not quite so goes Salinger. He never stirred us with a final, gripping monologue on America or youth or love like Mann did. He probably never offered anyone a cookie, and maybe nobody ever asked him for one. He went quietly because he wanted to. And here I am saying that I like the man. I know nothing about him except for the things he wanted me to know about him.
"That's all I'm going to tell about. I could probably tell you what I did after I went home, and how I got sick and all, and what school I'm supposed to go to next fall, after I get out of here, but I don't feel like it. I really don't. That stuff doesn't interest me too much right now."
~Holden Caulfield in "The Catcher in the Rye"
Thursday, January 7, 2010
And ever onward flees
My friend Dani left Chapel Hill last week to study education in Charlotte. She invited friends to a going away party at Linda's for her last taste as a Chapel Hill resident. My girlfriend and I went early because I could not stay as late as the others. Ryan arrived, and we talked about chess clocks and Scrabble for a half hour. I drifted into memories of my other goodbyes while we waited for Dani.
I remembered wishing Holly good luck in front of He's Not and reading Wolfe's senior poem with Jesse at Carolina Coffee Shop. Jenna left me in the Park Place parking lot. I cannot remember saying goodbye to Sergio, but I do remember him coming back. I saw Anne in Chicago and barely missed her in Chapel Hill months later. I found Molly within sight of the West Virginia capitol building. I ate with Victor in Union Square in New York City.
But I lost touch with Greg and Clark, who both still live in Chapel Hill. I have not talked with Kim since her wedding years ago. Emily and I see each other occasionally but mostly talk about our careers. My friends are learning, working, marrying, moving and growing. We used to do most of these things together, but it is OK that we cannot anymore. What we share now is a place that we call home or used to call home. For me, the living room of that home is Linda's.
The place is good for goodbyes because it is not. We go to Linda's for specials, trivia and good music, but the main draw is our friends. People at Linda's talk. We go there to celebrate each other. The best place to say goodbye in Chapel Hill is this place where we normally say hello.
I felt strange walking out with Dani still in the bar. I did not see much of her in the last year, a year in which her life changed enough so that something, or perhaps someone, could pull her out of Chapel Hill. It's hard to see a friend like her go even when the going is a casual formality. Over the course of time, she and I lived our lives more and more apart but ever present in the mind of the other. I hope the other side of the red pen is as good to her as she will be to it.
To friends.
I remembered wishing Holly good luck in front of He's Not and reading Wolfe's senior poem with Jesse at Carolina Coffee Shop. Jenna left me in the Park Place parking lot. I cannot remember saying goodbye to Sergio, but I do remember him coming back. I saw Anne in Chicago and barely missed her in Chapel Hill months later. I found Molly within sight of the West Virginia capitol building. I ate with Victor in Union Square in New York City.
But I lost touch with Greg and Clark, who both still live in Chapel Hill. I have not talked with Kim since her wedding years ago. Emily and I see each other occasionally but mostly talk about our careers. My friends are learning, working, marrying, moving and growing. We used to do most of these things together, but it is OK that we cannot anymore. What we share now is a place that we call home or used to call home. For me, the living room of that home is Linda's.
The place is good for goodbyes because it is not. We go to Linda's for specials, trivia and good music, but the main draw is our friends. People at Linda's talk. We go there to celebrate each other. The best place to say goodbye in Chapel Hill is this place where we normally say hello.
I felt strange walking out with Dani still in the bar. I did not see much of her in the last year, a year in which her life changed enough so that something, or perhaps someone, could pull her out of Chapel Hill. It's hard to see a friend like her go even when the going is a casual formality. Over the course of time, she and I lived our lives more and more apart but ever present in the mind of the other. I hope the other side of the red pen is as good to her as she will be to it.
To friends.
"The years will pass and very faint
Will be your call to these,
For time is scornful of the past
And ever onward flees.
But sometimes . . ."
~Thomas Wolfe, 1920
Monday, January 4, 2010
Marvin Austin and others return
The Tar Heels will return all five defensive standouts for the 2010 football season. One of them, Marvin Austin, reminded me why I love him but not Twitter with these notable, consecutive tweets from http://twitter.com/lifeofma.
Austin's publication upset Carolina fans who thought recruits might turn away from a coach on the run. Whether what Austin heard was true seemed to be a secondary concern, but I lost sleep over it. I nervously watched his tweets and Sports Illustrated's college rumor mill for any signs of Davis leaving town. He stayed.
In contrast nobody cared that Austin wrote about preparing for an aggressive shower. Of course Carolina fans know what to expect from him. We expect the same hair tossing, tongue wagging, smooth talking fellow who dances in the end zone during warm ups, and we like to think about him wearing clothes even though we would let him play in the nude if he wanted to.
Take this tweet from Nov. 21 after the win at Boston College: Ayyyyyeeeee how about dat carolina dfence.....it should have a tie on it cause dat b**** mean business...hahahaha...excuse my lingo..lol
Marvin, consider my advice if you ever return the favor and read my blog. Wear that tie you talked about instead of the birthday suit when you start your charity. You are my favorite Tar Heel because you love being one as much as I do.
Go to hell, State.
- Im bout to put on my birthday suit....hahahaha...all black attack
- if u were wondering.......I will be a tarheel for 2010!!!!!!!
- Its officially..official..hahahahaha...yea I could go get paid but in some things it aint all about the money...I love carolina point blank!
- Im bout to be ice cold next year...so I may as well givem helll...hahahaha....oh yea.. Go to Hell state!!!
- Ok so since imma be in n.c for another year..I think I should start up a charity...for less fortunate children in urdan neighborhoods
Austin's publication upset Carolina fans who thought recruits might turn away from a coach on the run. Whether what Austin heard was true seemed to be a secondary concern, but I lost sleep over it. I nervously watched his tweets and Sports Illustrated's college rumor mill for any signs of Davis leaving town. He stayed.
In contrast nobody cared that Austin wrote about preparing for an aggressive shower. Of course Carolina fans know what to expect from him. We expect the same hair tossing, tongue wagging, smooth talking fellow who dances in the end zone during warm ups, and we like to think about him wearing clothes even though we would let him play in the nude if he wanted to.
Take this tweet from Nov. 21 after the win at Boston College: Ayyyyyeeeee how about dat carolina dfence.....it should have a tie on it cause dat b**** mean business...hahahaha...excuse my lingo..lol
Marvin, consider my advice if you ever return the favor and read my blog. Wear that tie you talked about instead of the birthday suit when you start your charity. You are my favorite Tar Heel because you love being one as much as I do.
Go to hell, State.
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