Parlor Spider...Step In, Little Fly

Insightful thoughts and/or rants from atop the soapbox from one who wishes to share the "right" opinion with everyone.

Saturday, February 03, 2007

Thomas Wolfe Was Right

Dan in white on left and me in green on right

Memory is a selective thing: we can remember with absolute clarity seemingly trivial things and forget what we went to the store to get. I think Dan might have read Thomas Wolfe in high school at Trinity Prep. God knows we were subjected to everything else for our edification. Greek dramatists, poets and Latin instruction...(Remember the school from "Dead Poet's Society"? That was our school in almost every facet.)Looking back, it was the single most life-changing experience in my life, but at the time, it was, well, school except there was no Mom or Dad to tell me what to do. The Salvatorian priests, brothers and the upperclassmen were there for that express purpose. No matter that I had an uperclassman as a "big brother," he didn't protect me on the snipe hunt no more than anyone else. Those things I remember with clarity unmatched. I'm sure Dan has equally clear memories, but he has forgotten some things. To wit:
Dan, being a class ahead of me, was superior in every way. On the food chain, he was at the top, and I had to scramble to keep from BEING food. I begin to sweat even now remembering the time in a quasi-darkened gym when he leaned me up against the wall, jabbed a finger (or fist) in my chest and promised dire things were going to happen to me. See, Dan was the best basketball player in the Sioux City area...by far. I was ok, but not in his league at all. My job was to rebound, pass the ball, set screens and take charges (admittedly, this was back when officials still CALLED charging fouls and three seconds!). He has probably aso forgotten the game in which one of the local TV stations had come out to film our team as their team of the week. This was Dan's stage. I set the pick for him, rolled to the basket, got the return pass and heaved the ball into the balcony overhanging the floor! (OK, OK, I was nervous). I could see the TV guys laughing out loud and shaking their heads. Dan was not as amused, and I could bet he'd never give me the ball again.
He's forgotten these things. I have not. That's why the call was a surprise.
Dan called me one day this past year and wanted to set up a reunion-type thing to relive the 40 years which had passed since our school closed. He was in the last graduating class; I was not. Through subsequent emails, I see that Dan has a rather complete idea where most of the guys in his class are and a few of the guys in my class, including some of the teachers and coaches we shared. The idea of a reunion percolated long enough that it has become a reality. That's the fun part...there is another side.
Our last basketball game as a school ended in the sectional tournament final with a 69-66 loss to Leeds a school a couple of miles down the road. It was extremely painful, and another one of those memories that is as clear to me as if it happened yesterday. But I don't dwell on it...I mean, it's 40 years past. Dan, who lives in Sioux City now, has apparently had to live with that memory for all this time as he listens to jibes from the ex-Leeds players. His most recent thought (when he should have been being productive at work) was that it would be fun to avenge that loss when we meet this summer for the reunion. He contacted as many of the opposition as possible, and voila! it's game on! Therein lies the problem.
My wife and smarter member of the duo was all for the reunion idea: these are people from my past she's never met and a place she's never visited. When word of "The Game" got out, however, she began to hedge on attending:
"There's NO WAY you should get involved in such a thing! You'll get all competitive and hurt yourself! I'm too young to be a widow!" She's right on all fronts, of course, but I suspect it won't matter. Dan has thrown down the gauntlet; we could have and should have won that game; and the score remains unsettled. The fact that we're 40 years older is not of consequence. Thomas Wolfe be damned! It's ON! It'll probably end up like that "South Park" episode where Randy Marsh tries to relive his boy band days with tricky dance moves and ends up hospitalized. I have an edge, though, in that I live in a gym and can put up as many jumpers in a day as I wish; I can run tire drills until I fall over (about 3), and I can try to recapture the halcyon days of youth...maybe one CAN go home again...but I'm not counting on it.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home