Good Bye DJ

Dennis Johnson died today.

No Celtic ever wanted to win more than DJ.

I will never forget the 1987 Eastern Conference Finals game where he scored the winning basket off a feed from Larry Bird. Bird had stolen an inbounds pass from the great Isaiah Thomas. I can see that play like it was yesterday, and when I read he had died, that play flashed into my memory.

Sorry to see you go so soon DJ. My condolences to your family.

Tag in the Slow Lane

Tag! You're It! So I have been told.

Five things people don't know about me?

I have been thinking long and hard about that. Like my Mom, I usually wear things on my sleeve, and those around me pretty much know what there is to know about me. I guess you could say I am not really a private person. So, I may not come up with five, but here is what I have been thinking.

1. I am a "Third Culture Kid," (I am far from a kid anymore, but I was). Among other dysfunctions, third culture kids have close friends, but they expect to lose them when they move. So, I have had a lot of friends in the past, but when I moved on I failed to keep in touch. Only one college friend keeps in touch with me, and he has to work at it.

Maybe that's one of the reasons why I am stubbornly staying in Buffalo and am committed to trying to make a difference here.

2. Who's Body is This? Now I know that I have had more than one body during my life. There was the body of the football player, that of the young swimmer who swam across the lake everyday (and back), and the body of the construction worker who lugged 250 gallons of water a day. There was the body of the runner. I had that body for about 15 years, you could have practically cut paper on my shins. Then a toboggan accident ruined my knees and made me look for another form of exercise, so I took up cycling. There were also in between times, like when I drove buses to finance family and grad school. That body was a bit bottom heavy.

But today? Today I hardly recognize my body. Not because I can't see it because I only have one eye. Certainly not because I can't hear it because I only have one ear. Of course, if you first meet me you won't notice either of those, since both eye and ear look relatively normal. Crazy thing is that neither of the events that took my sight and hearing are really age related. Today my body is pretty heavy with a stomach the likes of which I have never seen. And there is the arthritis; usually 600 mg of Ibuprofen in the morning takes care of that. Oh, and you don't want to know about the prostate!

So, here I am with a body that I don't recognize. I don't really feel old, but this body doesn't do what it used to!

3. How did I get to be a writer? I know, I don't blog as much as I thought I would. A big reason for that is that I sit in front of a computer everyday and write professionally. It is not a career I aspired to in my youth. I write grant proposals, it is my way of seeking to make a difference for at risk children, youth and families in Buffalo.

Not that I think I am a great writer, I just work at it. I like staring at the screen (sometimes at the page) and tweaking my prose to turn a phrase that will engage the reader and get them to see the need. It seems to me that even a grant proposal can be literary and elegant. At my stage in life I care less about getting out and schmoozing and more about using words and language to inform and convince.

As I think back there are at least two influences on my life that I have to thank for guiding me in this direction. Miss Evelyn Hayden was my English teacher in High School. I was far from her star student, but she taught me to love narrative. She signed my High School Yearbook, The Initium (Latin for The Beginning), remarking about the strange questions I asked in class. It was years later that I realized that she had made such an impact on me.

I also owe a debt of gratitude to Dr. J. Edward Hakes, my grad school professor and the second reader of my Masters Thesis. He insisted that I had earned an A-, not because my work lacked intellectual heft, but because my grammar was lacking. It motivated me to work hard at writing, especially to make sure that my dissertation and articles that I wrote for publication were more finely crafted.

Thank you Ms. Hayden and Dr. Hakes.

Probably I should also thank my reading teacher from elementary school. I was placed in remedial reading because I was supposedly not reading at grade level. I have no idea what her name was and Mom is gone, so I have no one to ask.

In that class I discovered stories. My reading texts until then were about Dick and Jane and some dog named Spot. Whose dog was Spot anyway? I had absolutely no interest in seeing Dick run. Nor did I care to see Jane run! And Spot? Spot was running too! Who cares? But this teacher gave me real stories! When I "graduated" from remedial reading she gave me a beautiful edition of The Wizard of Oz.

So, I love narrative, not that I read much fiction. But, I read. I read. And, I write.

4. I have gotten back into the water. We have a great pool where I work and I have been doing laps. Not that I get in everyday. Colds have come and gone for me this winter, so I missed some days because of those. I also get concentrating on my work and forget I wanted to take a break at 1:30 or so and swim a few laps. But I am back in the water and it feels good. Won't take the weight off by itself, but it is good for my heart and my body. It's good for my mind too. I am up to 14 laps (round trip). Marcus, the lifeguard tells me that 20 will be a mile. I'll let you know when I swim a mile.

5. When you get to my age, not that I am that old, you begin to have thoughts about the end and your legacy. Of course, your health insurance company encourages those thoughts because they want to know if you have a Health Care Proxy. I don't right now, but I plan to get that done too.

I guess I will be satisfied if at the end people say that I cared for people and that I helped a few.

Now how do I go about tagging the next person?

Thurman Going to Canton!

ESPN leads their story with Michael Irvin, but for those of us from Buffalo, NY the big story is that the little running back who made the Bills go during the glory years is going to Canton.

OK, so they did not win a Super Bowl, do you know any other team that got there four years in a row? Do you think any team ever will?

Thurman Thomas richly deserves this honor and I will be watching his speech this summer. He makes four members of the Super Bowl Bills in the Hall. Marv Levy, Jim Kelly and James Lofton preceded Thurman.

There will be more. Bruce Smith should make it his first year (he retired in 2003 with 200 sacks). Andre Reed missed today, but he deserves to be there too.

I have two candidates that will need some luck and some lobbying. I think that Kent Hull was the nucleus of the offensive line that opened the holes for Thurman, Kent belongs in the Hall as one of the greatest centers to play the game. I also think that everyman, Steve Tasker, probably the greatest special teamer to ever play, deserves his space at Canton.

Congratulations Thurman! Thanks for the memories.