See Me Squeegee

On the first Sunday morning of December, 2016, the sports news cycle is full of Penn State football talk. The Nittany Lions surprisingly won the Big Ten championship, and all the buzz is whether they deserve a spot in the College Football Playoff.

Flash back to the first Saturday morning of November, 2011 – only five years ago – when the sports world awoke to a different type of discussion about Penn State football. News was trickling out that Penn State and its (at the time) legendary coach Joe Paterno had been complicit in years and years of child abuse.

So it’s been just about exactly 61 months since the news *first* broke (the story has continued to unfold, more gruesomely and less – let’s just say now it’s  “zero”- defensible for anyone involved).  Any NCAA punishments and sanctions against Penn State have already been lifted.  Penn State has already fought and won battles to have Paterno’s wins – which had been vacated as part of the initial NCAA punishment – reinstated, and a large group of former players is campaigning to have Paterno’s status (which ironically identifies him with three words: coach (true), teacher (eh), humanitarian (bullshit)) placed back near Beaver Stadium.  Penn State even actively honored Paterno before a game this season.  And, of course, Penn State fans – defiant of any attempts to back off of the university’s unabashed love for the legendary pedophile enabler – proudly chant “We Are…Penn State” without any remorse.

Penn State should make America sick.

Now hear me out. I’m a passionate sports fan in general and a massive fan of a school in the same exact division – the Big Ten East – as Penn State. I understand fandom and fully recognize that had I grown up in Pennsylvania and not in Michigan, it’s overwhelmingly likely that I’d be a big Penn State fan.  But I sincerely believe and vehemently hope that I’d be able to compartmentalize fandom and put it in its rightful place when faced with the actually-serious issue of child abuse.

Let me put it this way: I can forgive the sins of omission, but Penn State – both the university and the fan base – is horrifically guilty of sins of commission, and those are gross and unforgivable.

Penn State’s Sins of Omission

Let’s put the issue in direct context.  No one currently at Penn State directly contributed to the sexual abuse of dozens of children in the Penn State football facilities.  It even seems likely that most Penn State football fans are not even, themselves, active pedophiles!  So once you get past Jerry Sandusky, the evil monster himself; Joe Paterno, the man with all the power to stop the abuse *and* knowledge of the abuse; and other actors within the football and university administrations who had direct knowledge of what was going on, the greater Penn State community is mainly only guilty of one thing: putting football on such a high pedestal that it was more important than such egregious and brazen acts of child sexual abuse.

Since 2011 it has become abundantly clear that Penn State football aided and abetted Sandusky’s child abuse. Keep in mind this wasn’t a rogue employee engaging in illicit activities on home, off the clock.  Sandusky used Penn State football as a way to recruit his victims and performed these horrific acts in Penn State football facilities, and when Sandusky gave up coaching, Paterno granted him permanent access to those facilities as part of his “foundation” for troubled young boys, the primary recruitment method of his victims. So if you’re part of the Penn State community in 2011, you have to at least think: 1) That’s messed up; 2) We should probably spend less attention on football and think about how our rabid fandom helped – even in small part – make this atrocity possible; and 3) If we’re still proud of our university, let’s redirect our efforts to making sure that Penn State is a leader in child abuse prevention.

Right?

If you lose a friend or family member to cancer, you use your mourning energy to start a foundation in their name to raise money for cancer research.  If you lose your license from a DUI or your job from drug issues, you help make amends by trying to educate young people on how to avoid those temptations.  So if your school/team is implicated in a massive child abuse scandal, you rally the community behind efforts to rid the world of child abuse.

You shouldn’t be able to turn on a Penn State game or Google “Penn State Football” without hearing about Penn State’s involvement in the fight to end child abuse.  A percentage of every ticket sold should go to safe houses for victims; a ribbon-style sticker should be on every player’s shoulder pads or helmet as a reminder that “if you see something, say something;” there should be a moment of silence before every game; booster groups should be raising money and awareness and overall just looking for ways to use the power of 100,000+ people at every game and a massive, passionate fanbase to help address the issue.

But I get it.  Child abuse is a nasty topic and no one wants their brand to be forever linked to pedophilia.  The school likely wants to distance its reputation so that graduates and alumni don’t wear that stain on their resumes, so that prospective students don’t decline admission because of the stigma, so that athletic recruits don’t avoid State College.

Penn State should use its power to address the issue.  It should direct some of its proceeds or donations to the school of social work or to grants for psychology research into the causes and treatments for pedophilia.  After what the Penn State community did to enable Jerry Sandusky to torture young boys, it owes the world something.  But that requires a heck of a lot of pride-swallowing, action, money, and initiative.  It’s not overwhelmingly to forgive the sin of omission – Penn State and its community have not directly acted to make amends, and while I disagree I understand.

However…

Penn State’s Sins of Commission

Instead of using that energy to make a positive difference in the world, Penn State has used the last five years to defend Paterno at all turns, resist responsibility, actively ignore the plight of victims, and ultimately just act like spoiled jerks.  Instead of rallying its resources and energy around ways to address the issue, it has used that energy to:

-Fight to have Paterno’s wins restored

-Fight to have NCAA restrictions lifted

-Hold rallies to defend Paterno and campaign for the reinstatement of his statue

-Actively honor Paterno before a game during the 2016 season, commemorating his first game as coach 50 years prior

Now, this doesn’t characterize all Penn State fans, of course.  But it’s also not an outlier fringe group of a handful of fans.  This includes former players still within the public eye, massive groups of fans, petitions with thousands of signatures…  And what is disgusting is how active it is: it’s completely understandable to sit back in stunned silence and not do anything. It’s wholly another to look at the facts and allegations of the case and decide to act to promote Paterno and Penn State football over the interests of victims, to look at autumn pastime versus decades of child rape and think “I’d better do something…to defend the football program.”

Because here’s the thing: there is absolutely no easier punishment to take than officially vacating wins.  The games still happened!  If you want to remember the 1994 undefeated season or the Orange Bowl win over Miami to win the national championship, no one is stopping you.  YouTube clips still exist, Wikipedia articles will mention those games and aggregated statistics (maybe with an asterisk), ABC/ESPN producers will still set up your games against Nebraska by mentioning the 1994 season.  The only people affected will be 10-year old boys (ahem) looking up football records in the almanac or Guinness Book of World Records.  That’s it.  You’ve sacrificed nothing, and yet Penn State fans were willing to take action to not even give up that.

I’m a Michigan fan.  I loved the Fab Five, which has officially had its 1991-93 wins vacated.  And it’s a mild bummer.  I still remember those games, talk about how much I loved watching that team…those sanctions were the easiest thing in the world to agree to as a fan.  They haven’t changed any of our lives in the slightest. And that was for a recruiting violation…not for child sexual abuse.  I couldn’t imagine so desperately wanting to see those wins in an almanac that I’d get off my couch or give up a Tuesday night to defend child rape.

Same for the Paterno statue.  At the very least his reputation is “complicated” but there’s a very high likelihood that he was a monster.  Compelling evidence exists that he knew about Sandusky’s child abuse for 20+ years and not only kept him around and didn’t say anything but actively gave him fertile recruiting ground with the Second Mile charity.  I’m not saying you have to burn your LaVar Arrington jersey or turn off the TV any time Todd Blackledge or Matt Millen is on…but maybe wait a few years for the facts to settle before you go out of your way to actively advocate for a Paterno statue.  Because even if he’s more innocent than we think (keep in mind: he’s not 100% innocent and that at least is a fact) he’s not a victim!  There are dozens of actual victims, young boys whose lives were ruined or dramatically compromised by the use of Penn State football as a tool to draw them in, earn their trust, and then rape them.  The Paterno family can soothe itself with its millions of Penn State Football dollars while it waits for history to decide Joe’s ultimate legacy; the actual victims have to live with..I can’t even think about it or try to put myself in their shoes.

So when heard coach James Franklin calls his team’s win over Ohio State a necessary step in the healing process, he’s being an out-of-touch, arrogant, jerk.  There are actual victims who need to heal; Penn State fans need to exercise contrition before anyone should feel sorry for them.  And they won’t exercise that contrition.  Their actions show that they haven’t learned the lesson at all, that we can’t let football become so big that it overshadows basic human decency.  By actively choosing to defend and promote football instead of promoting the needs of child abuse victims, Penn State fans have shown that they’re recommitted to Paterno and the Nittany Lions over child justice and just general decency.

It’s appalling that in the only five years that this has been going on, the ABC/ESPN media machine, the Big Ten, the NCAA, and most gallingly Penn State fans have so quickly made football the sole priority.  By actively avoiding responsibility and reconciliation, Penn State  football should have earned the forever reputation as Pedophile U.  It’s nauseating to see them on TV and even more so to see their fan base so happy to pretend like nothing happened.  Which maybe shouldn’t be so surprising…their hero Joe Paterno taught them that.

Two years ago my brother, Sean, made a similar – and much grander – Irish journey, which among other things elicited this incredible story:

http://irishsafari.blogspot.ie/2014/08/indiana-jones-adventure-to-tully-cross.html

(Note: Please read…not only is it much more entertaining than this current post, but this current post won’t make much sense without the context.)

Of course, when I found myself in Ireland this week a similar journey was a must. That had been the highlight of Sean’s trip; the pub had initially been “discovered” (for our purposes at least) by our good friend Rory; and part of the Irish allure has always been getting way off the beaten path away from tourists and deeper into the homeland.  This pilgrimage would of course be a day well spent.

Having learned from my brother’s adventures, I was able to avoid the bus to the wrong town and the need to hire a bike some 15 miles away. With some advanced planning I managed to reduce the commute to a 5km walk after a 2-hours-and-change bus ride, but even so the journey was part of the destination. Ireland is gorgeous!  The bus from Galway first runs along the largest lake in Ireland, then progresses past lakes and mountains to “Connemara Loop” – a road that loops around Connemara National Park.  CityLink wifi be damned, virtually no one turned on a phone or tablet…all eyes were glued on some of the most spectacular scenery in the world. The ride through Clifden to Letterfrack went too quickly, if you ask me…that’s right, rural Ireland makes you beg for more time on the bus.

Alas, while you’re walking for 45 minutes into a cold headwind to begin drinking in the early afternoon, a man is forced to wonder whether the destination is worth the journey (which is the destination itself of course, but still…).  Sean’s experience at Paddy Coyne’s was amazing, but lots of that was due to its uniqueness and improbability; would mine be anywhere near that great?  And this was a whole day affair – bus station by 8:30 to make sure I caught the 9am bus to get to Letterfrack before noon and the pub before 1, with a pretty hard 5pm cutoff to walk back for the only return bus of the day at 6:05.  If it’s closed, or they’re not all that happy to see me, or it’s just a bummer, I’d have given up a whole day simply to have a few beers alone.

The scenery continued to make it a trip well-spent; Tully Cross is on the Atlantic coast with mountains and bays and greenery abound.  And there was history to be seen, too – along the walk I encountered a subdivision that seemed horrendously out of place in the more traditional countryside – a place well more suited to Novi or Grand Blanc, Michigan.  Walking closer, I saw a sign that the entire not-completely-finished neighborhood was going to auction – the Celtic Tiger boom of the early 2000s and bust of 2008 was staring me right in the face within a mile of Paddy Coyne’s.  I felt a mixture of sad – such stark evidence of how the global recession had affected my homeland, and even more so evidence of how global corporatism had blighted this amazing landscape – and of schadenfreude: how dare those developers think they can profit off of Irish tradition and natural beauty!  And how wonderful that a centuries-old pub nearby was thriving and attracting Americans (well, three of us now that I know of) for its authenticity while the bankers and opportunists suffer just down the hill.

As I turned the corner into the small town of Tully Cross, I saw two men setting up for the coming weekend’s Mussel Fest, and they immediately smiled and greeted me.  This was the small town hospitality I was looking for!  And just beyond them the ocean gleamed below and the green mountains – including one where, legend has it, Saint Patrick himself would go to pray – were illuminated by sunbeams poking through the light clouds.  But now the moment of truth: Paddy Coyne’s.  I walked past once just to get a feel for the town before taking my place on a barstool, and then when I circled back and walked to the door it was…closed.  And locked.  And a sign nearby mentioned that “food service resumes March 15 (it was late April, so I was in luck!) from 5pm each day (uh oh…even if I can kill 4+ hours here I only have time to slam one beer before I have to hustle back to the bus or risk being stranded).”  I returned to the men setting up the fair and asked when Paddy Coyne’s would open: they both knew that Colin Coyne (son of Gerry, the owner) was “around today” and that the pub should open later in the afternoon.  I sat on a bench out front and contemplated my next move.

Hunger intervened, and I had seen another pub – Anglers Rest – a few doors down, and it was open.  I popped in to grab something to eat and wait it out. I sat at the bar and a waitress came to take my order, and a few minutes later the bartender entered and greeted me. I felt the need to tell my story:”I’m here from the States and took a bus up to Letterfrack this morning to see Tully Cross.  This town – and Paddy Coyne’s down the street – has some legendary significance to my friends and family.”  He indulged me and I told the story further “a couple years ago my brother took a crazy trip here to see a picture that our friend had left of his grandfather in the bar.  It probably sounds crazy but that was the highlight of his trip and I’m here to see it for myself.”

The bartender, Naill, smiled and said “I tend bar there, too. I remember your brother and I know exactly the picture you’re talking about.  I’m opening there at 3…I’ll take you right to it.”

I was amazed – I had been hopeful that I’d find the photo and talk to Gerry Coyne about the story, but didn’t dream that the stories would remain so significant here years later.  I described Sean and Rory to Naill and he remembered them exactly. He brought out the guestbook – from the 1970s to the early 2000s this volume spanned – and had me read looking for Rory (I didn’t find him) and sign on behalf of the three of us.  He introduced me to some regulars and we talked (mostly about Donald Trump, but also about Ireland’s current political problems of its own), and at 3pm we headed to Paddy’s.  Gerry Coyne bought me a Smithwicks and they gave me the grand tour, including Rory’s grandfather’s photo. I took a photo of the photo to send to Rory, and via the magic of modern technology I was able to text with him and relay his thoughts to the bartenders and owners he had befriended more than a decade before.

In “that’s Ireland” fashion, I struck up conversations with locals and they implored me to stay past my 5pm cutoff for one more pint (which turned into two) and they’d drive me to the bus.  They knew my family names – the Bentons from County Tipperary and the Galvins from County Kerry – and some of the histories, and in this tiny town on the edge of Ireland, I felt that sense of family and belonging in Ireland that had been my primary motivation for wanting to visit.  Thousands of miles away from any mailing address I’ve ever had, I felt at home.

“Norm!” – everyone at Cheers

“What I love most about Dublin is the diversity, the blend of cultures.” – Patrick Hughes, Dublin tour guide

I came here searching the former, but at first it was all the latter.  And, believe me, this isn’t a pro-Trump (or pro-Cruz) post, but I was disappointed.  Enter Seinfeld: not that there’s anything wrong with that, variety is the spice of life, etc.  But a huge part of my excitement to travel to Ireland was to discover my ancestry, to go to a place where most people were just like me.  If I wanted to see people of all walks of life gather together to bump into each other while looking at their phones walking past TGI Friday’s, I could have gone virtually anywhere else.  But here I was, Irish in spirit but more of a mutt in practice, in a city that pretty well echoed that same composition.

But travel is the primary way to spend money and end up richer.  And I did both.

As I wandered around the city of Dublin, past Thai and sushi restaurants, past bars advertising Budweiser and Carlsberg, past hordes of non-redhead, not-befreckled humans, I felt like something was missing.  And as I walked I realized what it was: my O’Bama’s Irish Pub t-shirt, of course, guaranteed that it wasn’t abject hatred of multiculturalism, but it was indeed a longing for an increased sense of belonging and exclusivity: this was the land of my ancestors, and I wanted to fit right in.  Nevermind that my most recent direct forebear left more than a hundred years ago (when the land I walked upon was still called “England,” but I’ll get to that), or that at least a quarter of my blood was non-Irish.  I – far from “pure Irish”- wanted a pure Irish experience.  So I soldiered on, and discovered:

There’s no such thing.  That “Viking Tours” duckboat I had scowled at? Perfectly at home: the Vikings are a huge part of the early foundation of Ireland.  As were the Gauls and Normans: Galway, from where I type this?  “Gaul” meant “foreigner” to the early Irish…this was French/Norman/Gaul territory in the 1200s.  So I wonder about the prefix to my last name, Galvin…  Then, of course, there are the British, who are responsible for the majority of nice-looking Irish architecture (but then again also the potato famine…Irish farms were producing tons and tons of other cash crops, but the Crown would only allow the Irish people the potatoes).  My middle name, Patrick – named after Patrick Benton – is as Irish as a name gets…right?  Except for that St. Patrick was English, and only returned to Ireland – after having escaped jail here – upon God’s request to convert and save the Irish people.

As I learned about the crooked family trees of Irish bloodlines and of my own, I thought more about my place in all of this.  Even at its purest, Ireland was the land my ancestors left because of starvation and poverty; why had I glorified it so much in my mind?  And, as with most nationalities, “Irish” is a blend of several bloodlines and influences; the Ireland of the 1000-1500 era saw immigration like the United States did centuries later.  So why my – and “our” – fascination with Ireland?

The more I get to travel internationally, the more I realize this: we’re all very similar.  I like being Irish the same way that on any of these trips I make a point to pack a Detroit Tigers hat and a Michigan shirt…I want to belong to something, and to be in a position where someone will recognize that we both belong to the same “exclusive” club. Our families and towns are a bit too small; the world itself is way too big (unless aliens attack, of course, and then we’ll all band together). We’re all looking to belong to something bigger than ourselves but smaller and more exclusive than the whole. Here in Ireland, “we” (can I say that?) identify by the counties our ancestors are from (Tipperary and Clare for me…at least I think); in the States we identify by our primary nationalities, by the colleges we went to, by the regions we’re from..

Which brings me back to my first day here.  I came seeking belonging, a place where “everyone knows my name” (and they do…I’ve seen it on buses and signs!). And I’ve found that, but differently and more so.  My Irish roots are far from “roots” – I belong here as much as I belong in Michigan, where I grew up, and in England, where I know at least some of my Irish ancestors are from. And today some locals mentioned that the Bentons – my grandmother’s father’s family that we assumed had some English origin – of County Tipperary were a Jewish family.  So my roots may extend even further out of Catholic Ireland through Protestant England to Jewish…who knows where? Patrick Benton escaped Irish poverty the way that someone farther back than him escaped religious persecution, and before that I’m sure there were plenty more instances where my ancestors moved around for a better life.  Your family lineage – whoever you may be and wherever you may be from – is probably similarly erratic.

Every time I travel to a new place, I’m reminded that we’re all global citizens, much more alike than we are different. In different places I see similarities; this time I went to a place where I thought there would be more similarities and learned about differences in my homeland and ancestry.  As I continue this journey, I’m proud to be Irish – I still need that belonging – but just as proud to be whatever else I am along the way. And while I can’t smile walking past a freaking TGI Friday’s in Dublin, I can certainly smile at whomever is walking the other direction…whether we’re long lost relatives or just complete strangers, we have a lot in common.

For most of my life it’s been simple: you support the team 100%, you root for them until the final buzzer, you hope against logic for a win and when you lose you immediately start thinking about next week or next year. Shoot, if America has a third national anthem behind “The Star Spangled Banner” and “God Bless America,” that anthem even includes the line “for it’s root, root, root for the home team; if they don’t win it’s a shame.” (It also includes some direct product placement for Cracker Jack, meaning that it really fits the American brand as a national anthem, but that’s another post altogether…)

But thanks to the team I felt the most loyal to (the Michigan Wolverines) and to the team I probably care about most right now (the Detroit Tigers), I’m questioning the notion of sports loyalty and demanding that that loyalty go both ways.  Here’s my story.

The Easy Explanation: The Detroit Tigers

I was six years old when the Tigers won the 1984 World Series and it was amazing – a magical summer from which I still vividly remember Ernie Harwell’s voice on the radio, the animated Tiger promo on TV before turning it over to George Kell, and countless evenings falling asleep watching games on TV or listening to them on the radio – I was six!! – and waking up the next morning to check the box score in the newspaper. My favorite player was Alan Trammell – he’d go on to win World Series MVP thanks mostly to a 2-HR, 4-RBI game my dad attended at Tiger Stadium, I’ll never forget – mainly because I liked the double consonants in his box score abbreviation Trmmll. We celebrated with the whole city the night they finished off the Padres – when the doorbell rang minutes after Willie Hernandez jumped into Lance Parrish’s arms after the popout to third, a neighbor dumped a beer on my father’s head and the night continued from there – and I was a Detroit Tiger for Halloween a week or so later.  Three years later we made the playoffs again, and then…

For nineteen years I really didn’t care.  The team was terrible – it set the MLB record for most losses in a season during that stretch and was really never relevant past June.  But from 2006 on I’ve been a huge fan again, ever since the team had a hot April and May in 2006 and showed some promise.  It made the World Series that year and has been back to the postseason several times since, and more importantly it’s galvanized Metro Detroit and all of us expatriates – it’s bonded together a community that desperately needed inspiration in the face of global recession and its devastating impact on the auto industry and the city of Detroit (much like, around the same time, the New Orleans Saints lifted up the Katrina-ravaged city of New Orleans…more on all this in a second).  It’s brought millions into a struggling – bankrupt, even – city and made us all feel proud.  I can honestly say that between the ages of 10 and 25 I didn’t care at all about baseball and now I’m a massive fan, and it’s due entirely to one word: the “Detroit” in Detroit Tigers.

That word Detroit is everything to me, just like the words “New Orleans” meant so much to Saints fans, like the letters “U-S-A” meant so much during the Miracle on Ice, and really just like the phrase “<Geographic Place> _________s” means to 90+% of any team’s fans. Sports are all kinds of fun, but of the reasons we truly care about any single game, the geographic name attached to “Lions/Tigers/Bears” represents a massive proportion.  Shakespeare asks “would a rose by any other name smell as sweet?” and my answer is “the Lions stink, but only by the name Detroit can they find my unconditional love.”  Offensive coordinator Romeo Crennel finds millions of Juliets by the city half of his employer’s name alone – we care because the geographic branding of sports makes us care.

And long story short, we spend time, money, and energy on that love with this part of the deal in place: Superstar Athlete X can make millions of dollars while making Billionaire Owner Y tens of millions more, just as long as while playing under the banner of “City/State/Region(I see you Patriots/Buccaneers)” they pretend to care just as much as we do.  Which brings me back to the Tigers.  We Detroiters love them unconditionally – but we’ll boo the heck out of a player that offends us.  It’s not batting average – for the most part we love Mendoza-line Alex Avila because he takes a licking for us and keeps on ticking.  It’s not salary and underperformance – we’re all pulling for Justin Verlander to discover his MVP stuff even while watching guys nowhere near his pay grade like Madison Bumgardner and James Shields light up the World Series.

But when overpriced 1st baseman Prince Fielder ends his 0-for-infinity postseason with the Tigers last season by claiming that he won’t let it bother him because he has kids and he’s on to the next thing, screw him. And when overpriced reliever Joe Nathan blows a save on a Sunday in Toronto (after the team lost on Saturday) and says it won’t ruin his weekend, screw him.  We don’t mind that you make millions off our nine dollar stadium beers and the countless in-game promotions for Belle Tire and 1-800-CALL-SAM that litter your broadcasts, just as long as you pretend you care as much as we do.

And it’s fucking easy. When things go well, say “and don’t let me forget to thank the best damn fans in the land…they really kept us going out there.”  When things go poorly you don’t even have to mention us (although it would be nice): “I let myself down, I let my teammates down (and I let the fans down) and you can rest assured that’s going to fuel some intense workouts during the offseason.”

I mean, come on guys. Everyone lies to keep the people interested in them happy. Former romantic partners say “it’s not you, it’s me.” Employers go the Up In The Air route telling us “Anyone who’s ever changed the world has been in your position.”  Politicians tell us that they’re about change and the little guy. Shoot, the strippers upon whom you make it rain make almost your damn salary lying to fans, and the best analogue to you is rockstars who love nothing more than to call out the city name where they’re playing “Helooooo, Deeeetroit” to make us think they care about the city between Cleveland and Chicago on this 85-city tour.  We don’t pay exorbitant ticket prices just to watch you play; we pay them because we think you care about us collectively like you think we care about you individually.  You know damn well we’d sell you down the river for someone with a .08 higher batting average and we know that you’d sleep with our girlfriend without caring about either of us.  It’s the illusion that makes this fun, so get on board.  You’re playing under the banner of our city, and that banner accounts for a huge part of your salary.  Act like you care.

Now, before I leave the Tigers let me illustrate this point that the city name matters so much.  For decades “they” have been saying how soccer is just about to take off in the US, and it’s only gradually begun to escalate in recent years.  Why?  In large part because great soccer players play for teams with names that don’t resonate with us. It’s not that we don’t recognize the talent of Neymar and Messi, it’s just that none of us live in Spain where they play.  It’s not even the low scoring that people complain ab out – tons of NFL games are field goal snoozefests and baseball and hockey games are often 2-1 or 3-2. We root for the teams geographically associated with where we live, which is why “Tampa Bay” (Buccaneers, Rays, Lightning) isn’t named after a city (the Tampa Bay is an inlet of the Gulf of Mexico; Tampa is a city but St. Petersburg on the other side of the Bay is also a city so they named it after the waterway to get the whole area interested), “Carolina” (Panthers, Hurricanes) isn’t named after a state, and the New York Jets and Giants aren’t named after the city/state they play in.  Teams know that their branding is massively dependent on geography, which is why they lean on the brand names of the areas they wish to serve/exploit.  Which brings me too…

It’s Complicated: University of Michigan

As I type this, a huge portion of the Michigan fanbase is rooting for our Athletic Director, Dave Brandon, to be fired.  No one is really “rooting” anymore for the football coach, Brady Hoke, to be fired because there’s no rooting to be done. He’s a terrible football coach, a dead man walking, and he’ll walk away having “””earned””” (one set of quotation marks didn’t seem enough) over $15 million for his “”efforts.””

Now, if you’re not a Michigan fan/alum you might think that the outcry is either just about football results (which are dismal) or about both football results and the handling of Shane Morris’ concussion in the recent game against Minnesota. But that’s nowhere near the whole story.  In his four years as athletic director, Brandon has seemingly thrived on antagonizing students and alumni, with his exploits, among others, including:

-the escalation of ticket prices for students from ~$28/game to ~$42/game (a 50% increase in the days of pretty flat inflation)

-the corporatization of the game experience, with in-game advertisements on the (new-ish) jumbotrons, piped-in rock music drowning out the band and students, etc*.

-overwhelming “Constant Contact(TM)” with alums and season ticket holders to advertise products, events, and donation opportunities

-an antagonistic relationship with fans (emailing fans to “avoid driving on Stadium Blvd.” to not see his new multimillion dollar ad billboard, telling fans to “find another team to support”, holding press conferences talking about how “real fans would support his decisions,” etc.

-raising overall ticket prices and seat donations to a deteriorating football product with an unappealing schedule, and burning through what used to be a decades-long waiting list for season tickets to what is now the need to huck single-game tickets for free with purchase of Coca-Cola products.

Now, the long version of all this is a tirade I’ve already given on several installments of the Buckeye Brothers Podcast (yep, I’m consorting with the enemy now looking for an outlet to express my frustration), but the shorter version is this:

I get that pro sports have pure capitalism as their master, and that they have to appeal to the lowest common denominator to maximize revenue – especially when the product itself is so often out of their control with the need for parity. With 32 teams in each league and one champion per year, all held in by salary caps and trade deadlines and the like, every team will have some down years and need to resort to gimmickry to attract casual fans via group sales stunts and overdone hype. But college should be different – even at a school like Michigan with 110,000 seats to fill, there are tens of thousands of students each year *which also* means that there are hundreds of thousands of alumni who want to relive their glory days by returning to campus.  And we just need a reason.  There are only a few “cathedrals” in modern sports anymore, but they’re magnificent – Fenway, Wrigley, Lambeau…  Sports don’t matter in a vacuum; they matter in large part because they’ve always mattered.  Go to a game at Fenway and you can feel the Curse of the Bambino, the almost-but-not-quite games of the 70s and of 86, the Splendid Splinter and the comeback in 2004.  Fenway is as much a part of Boston history as the Freedom Trail now, just as Wrigley is a part of the Chicago experience and every Wisconsinite or Yooper has a pilgrimage to make to Lambeau.  And in that vein, almost every Michigan alum wants to get back to campus now and then and the Big House is a centerpiece of a visit, the reason to come home (um…homecoming).

And here’s my point – Dave Brandon has squeezed alumni and students both to maximize 2011-14 profits, but in doing so he’s taught us a very important lesson, even while he represents a nonprofit.  We’re customers to the university, not stakeholders or members of a community.  And like Eve biting the apple, I think most of us can’t un-learn that lesson.

Is it prices?  Probably not specifically, but those straws have been building on our camellbacks.

Is it piped in music?  Not really, but like Steve Harvey says about too many instructions at events “Get Louder?  I spent $80 on these tickets…motherfucker you get louder.”  The college experience has always been about the whole thing – the band, the students, the campus; if you want to be a pro experience, keep in mind that the pros are all better athletes.  We like college for different reasons.

Is it the advertising? Again, not really, but I remember working with Brandon’s predecessor, Bill Martin, who told me casually one day in 2001 that the university had been offered “seven figures” for an “understated logo” on the scoreboard by one of the Big Three automakers. A recent business school grad I wondered why we wouldn’t take that, especially knowing that ads would someday come so the opportunity cost of that money was especially high in light of the fact that someday that no-ads policy would be broken. And he explained to me that the Michigan experience was about the whole experience and not just pimping out football, that financially that decision would make great sense but the goodwill it would burn with fans may not be worth it.  And what I read into that was that it wasn’t about short-term revenues but more about long-term community.  Dave Brandon’s motto – he’s said this – is “if it ain’t broke, break it.”  Which is great if you’re a CEO looking for credit for a rebuilding project, but kind of awful if, four years later, you’ve alienated extremely loyal fans, ruined a waiting list to even buy your product, and all the while presided over the deterioration of that product itself.

And to the main point of this post itself – Brandon has burned an insane amount of loyalty.  The amazing thing about “sports marketing” is that teams have to rank among most loyalty-driven brands in the world. There’s simply no replacement for Michigan for me – I either love and care about Michigan football or I don’t care about college football at all. I grew up in Michigan and went to Michigan…that’s it for me, and the same goes for Alabama fans with the Crimson Tide or Texas fans with the Longhorns. If I like cola and Coke pisses me off, there’s always Pepsi.  If I like McDonald’s and they screw me over, hello Wendy’s.  But I’ll never love Michigan State or Ohio State or even UCLA near where I live.

All we ask as fans is some loyalty in return, even if it’s loyalty masquerading as “customer retention protocol.”  And I think we deserve it – Dave Brandon is (for the next couple weeks) using the name of the university where I earned two degrees and spent some of the best years of my life.  Represent that name well.  The Tigers, Lions, Pistons, and Red Wings are playing under the banner of the city where I grew up, the city that I love.  Pretend you care about it too.  Yeah, we fans are customers but as long as you let us think we’re community members we’ll provide you with every marketer’s dream – undying loyalty and zero probability of switching brands.  A little loyalty in return, please.  The ball’s in your court.

By now we all know about Donald Sterling’s comments, and one of today’s biggest story is a brewing controversy regarding Mark Cuban’s discussion of them, in which Cuban admits to being a little prejudiced in his own life.  Most notably – but I’d argue certainly not most importantly – Cuban mentions:

“I mean, we’re all prejudiced in one way or another. If I see a black kid in a hoodie and it’s late at night, I’m walking to the other side of the street. And if on that side of the street, there’s a guy that has tattoos all over his face — white guy, bald head, tattoos everywhere — I’m walking back to the other side of the street. And the list goes on of stereotypes that we all live up to and are fearful of.”

Why not most importantly?  Because this is Cuban’s entryway to a real, substantive discussion on race, as he immediately adds “I know that I’m not perfect. I know that I live in a glass house, and it’s not appropriate for me to throw stones.”  In his comments, Cuban opens the issue in a critically important way – no one is perfect when it comes to discrimination – be it race, nationality, gender, sexual preference, disability – and so while we all relish the opportunity to point the racist finger outward at someone like Donald Sterling (or Duck Dynasty or Cosmo Kramer), we often do so at the expense of a self-aware look inward.

To me, Cuban’s comments open up two extremely important points about discrimination:

1) As a nation we’re far too quick to point the finger outward at “trivial racism” (or discrimination) and that distracts us from the real issue of real, hurtful, discrimination.

2) In our rush to attack someone like Cuban for his introspective, candid comments, we set progress back immeasurably.

Now, before I dig in, let me give the typical white, heterosexual, middle class white guy disclaimers: I’m all of the above, and especially since I’m writing because of the aftermath of the Mark Cuban “controversy” I should know better than to insert my own opinions and experiences when it comes to a discussion of race/gender/sexual-identity. I have black, gay, and far too many female friends (you could easily call me the mayor of the “Friend Zone”); I’ve hired members of all those communities and several more; and, like Cuban, I’m not perfect when it comes to prejudice.  But I try – I’ve taught in urban public schools and been a featured speaker at (Women/Blacks/Hispanics) in Business conferences, and as I’ll explain later I’ve done a lot of listening and learning, particularly as an adult, when I’ve gotten to interact with different cultures.  So with all those “I love _______ people” disclaimers, let’s tackle point 1.

1) Pop Culture Racism Outrage Is A Smokescreen

It’s almost a biannual tradition now – about every six months, someone borderline-famous says something horrifically racist and we all get to point our fingers and proclaim – yell it with me now, America – “RACIST!!!!!!!!”  And in doing so we feel great about ourselves.  Take *that* Riley Cooper / Paula Deen / Cosmo Kramer / Don Imus / Donald Sterling! You’re racist, and since I so clearly recognize that fact that must mean that I’m not.  Shame on you, good for me.

As Americans, we love our opportunity to point that racist finger. We all get to feel good about ourselves, the media get their Nielsen ratings and pay-per-clicks, some 1%-er loses their endorsements, and rednecks and Westboro Baptists get to try to improperly apply the First Amendment to public opinion (and not to government punishment).

But at what expense? In doing so we take ourselves back thousands of years as a culture.

The origin of “scapegoat” comes from an actual goat – in ancient Syria, centuries before Christ, the tradition was to load up a goat with all the sins of the community and cast that goat away, taking with it the sins and regrets of the people.  And isn’t that what we do every time we chastise a racist celebrity?  We’re all guilty of some kind of prejudice, of some kind of stereotype, of some kind of discrimination however inadvertent or subconscious it may be.  But when we get to pile that on the back of Donald Sterling or, for today, Mark Cuban, we get to blame and look down upon someone else and absolve our own sins.

Which isn’t to defend these idiots, but rather to say that they’re essentially just idiot pawns. Donald Sterling’s comments don’t really affect anyone…but Donald Sterling’s hiring and rental practices did.  Riley Cooper using the N-word at a concert didn’t really hurt anyone – but voter registration laws in that same city of Philadelphia sure did.  It’s easy to get angry at a word or a phrase, but as our moms – black or white – said, sticks and stones may break our bones but names won’t *really* hurt us.  They just distract us from the voter ID laws and discriminatory hiring and housing policies that hold back generations of people.

Which brings me to point 2:

2) In our  zeal to yell “Prejudice!” at anyone but ourselves, we preempt genuine discussion and understanding.

Let me start this with a story – ten years ago I would have almost certainly voted against gay marriage, and would have been offended to see a man kiss another man during the NFL Draft. Six years ago I voted in favor of gay marriage and last week I was happy for Michael Sam when he was drafted and celebrated with his boyfriend. What changed?  A gay coworker named Mark and, years later, a gay colleague named Kevin.  Both could sense that I was a little uncomfortable with “gay,” and both handled it with humor.  I worked with Mark at a part-time job at the “Package Pickup” (which would be a great name for a gay bar…he’d have loved that joke) desk at the Hudson’s store at Briarwood Mall in Ann Arbor. Mark loved to page me on the walkie-talkie and send me to “Women’s Intimates” where he and often another friend would watch me walk around uncomfortably trying not to stare at lingerie or pretty girls about to buy some, and then they’d jump out from behind a rack and laugh.  Kevin – who worked for me in Chicago while I was at headquarters in LA – would always jokingly let me know when he and his friends were headed out to Napa or San Francisco for a “boys weekend” and let me know they’d save room in the hot tub for me.  And both guys would ask me questions about football and mention girls they knew that they thought would like me and ultimately were just looking for common ground.  And I appreciate the heck out of them for it – I was a little bit of a bigot in regard to the gay thing, largely because I just didn’t know much about or deal much with it.  But once I got to know individuals within that community, and once they were patient and accommodating and had a sense of humor about it, it was impossible to discriminate or feel any ill will.  I became gay-friendly because the first few gays I knew were friendly.

I was able to grow in my tolerance because they were tolerant of my ignorance.

Fast-forward to Mark Cuban’s comments today, and the backlash from many:

-Why did he mention hoodies? It’s racist to summon Trayvon Martin.

-Why did he equate hoodies-and-blacks with tattooed-skinhead whites? That’s racist.

-Why would an NBA owner admit to racism in the Donald Sterling aftermath? We need a unified front to rid the NBA/world of Sterling.

Now, I don’t want to put words in Cuban’s mouth especially while I’m defending him, to an extent, from others doing the same. But in relation to point #1, as we rush to attack any potential perceived racism in his comments we lose the subtlety and potential progress in his intent. Was he wrong to “equate” hoodies with skinhead tattoos? Maybe to the naked eye, but I’d argue that his intent may have been to create that dichotomy for effect – he was *admitting* to being a bit stereotypical, so it fits his agenda: “a young black man in a temporary fashion choice may well frighten me just as much as a scary white guy who’s made some intimidating permanent life choices”.  If you’re admitting a bit of personal shame in your prejudice, that’s the kind of thing you’d admit.

And I say this less as a white guy and more as a Democrat who worries about our mirror-image-of-Tea-Party fringe: I learned in college – at a very liberal university that pushed liberal viewpoints in many social sciences / humanities classes – if you’re a member of the majority (be it male, or white, or heterosexual, or all of the above) in a discussion about issues related to the minority, just don’t say anything. Like Cuban today, if you don’t perfectly articulate exactly the point that you want to make and nothing more, you run the very real risk that your comments will be dissected and maybe distorted to make you look like, at best, privileged and out-of-touch, and, at worst, a bigot or a racist.  Now, let me balance that – there’s a ton of value in being forced to listen and a ton of value in having to really consider alternative points of view. But my experience tells me that such a charged environment of “gotcha racism” leads to resentment and exclusion, and that a culture of acceptance – of the disenfranchised minority and of the ignorance of the majority, particularly if it’s rendered humbly and in the spirit of curiosity and tolerance – can allow us all to grow and learn.

Sadly, as reaction to Cuban proved today, we’re still mired in “gotcha racism” often at the expense of addressing and changing the real, underlying, crippling racism that holds people back. We lambaste those who say the N-word but in doing so we take our eyes off of employers that don’t give black applicants a fair look. We attack for an unbalanced hypothetical comparison those who admit to racism and to a desire to learn but we don’t address the inequality in access to quality schools or pre-K education. While we scapegoat reality show celebrities and C-list disc jockeys, we ignore the institutional discrimination that comes from repealing sections of the Civil Rights Act, from continued attempts to restrict the vote, from political campaigns and slogans designed to paint minority and female candidates as “outsiders” and “not true Americans.”  We love a good controversy, but in doing so we ignore real progress.

Donald Sterling is an idiot, but he’s also a senile old rich guy whose days of real discrimination – through housing and employment – are behind him. He’s irrelevant, yet he’s headline news.  While we pointed our fingers directly at Sterling, one of his colleagues, Mark Cuban, dared to point the finger back at himself introspectively to really address the discrimination that lies beneath.  For his doing so, he was roundly criticized.  Who’s really holding America back?

“What do you say when people in L.A. ask you about Detroit?” he asked.  We were standing in the kitchen of their new house in Detroit’s north suburbs, me, my best friend from high school, Justin, and his wife, Lindsay.  He knew the answer even if neither of us could articulate it well in words.  You could say that he wanted Lindsay to hear the answer, but we both knew that wasn’t really possible either.  As I cocked my head back in thought, searching for words that may never have been invented, I couldn’t help but smile a big, authentic, involuntary smile.

“See?” he asked his wife.  And then we were all smiling, thinking the same thing.  Home.

I wasn’t more than 4 or 5 years old, in the waiting room of a doctor’s office reading what I think was a Dr. Seuss book but it could have been something similar…there was definitely a playful tone to it and it rhymed, but there was a touch of sarcasm to keep the parents engaged too.  My mom was with my brother for an appointment and I had figured out how to read enough by then that I could entertain myself in the corner.  It was an alphabet-style book, one of those A is for _________, B is for ________ kinds of things.  And I don’t know if it was C is for Caribbean or H is for Hawaii or V is for Vacation or whatever it was, but the joke on the page was to the extent of “oh the places you’ll go…but you’ll probably never go to these exotic places.”  I don’t remember too much, but I’ll never forget the punchline:

“Maybe someday you’ll go to Detroit.”

That may not have been the exact moment that I realized that the city I lived in, the only home I really knew, was a national punchline, but that was my first brush with hard-hitting sarcasm and I had no choice but to realize what it meant.  Couple that with my dad’s Detroit Marathon t-shirts that said “Say Nice Things About Detroit” and Channel 4’s “Stand Up and Tell ‘Em You’re From Detroit” ad campaign and it wasn’t too long after I started reading that I was able to tell that Detroit had a bad reputation, one that we as Detroiters felt we needed to defend against.

At the time I didn’t understand why anyone would have anything bad to say about Detroit.  I liked my school.  I liked my friends.  I liked long summer days when it’s light out until 10pm because we were on the western edge of the eastern time zone.  I liked fall when leaves fell from the trees and you could rake them in a pile and jump into them.  I liked winter when you could ice skate on frozen ponds and sled down snowy hills.  I liked spring, when everything felt fresh and new again and 50 degrees felt like midsummer.  I liked watching Billy Sims and the Lions and Isiah Thomas and the Pistons and listening to Ernie Harwell call Tigers games on the radio and going to Tigers games at old Tiger Stadium – parking next to the old Firestone building and walking across the brick section of Michigan Avenue in Corktown and seeing the immaculately cut grass in the outfield and the Olde English D everywhere.

Now I get it.  You could argue that Detroit has terrible weather. It’s a fact that Detroit has a scary crime rate (I chuckle at NYC native Jay-Z’s lyric “I’m from the murder capital, will we murder for capital” – no you’re not, Jigga…it’s us, St. Louis, or DC. Not that I’m proud.).  It’s a fact that the Detroit has declared bankruptcy, that it’s losing population faster than its Lions can lose games, that its public transportation system is worse than – gasp – Los Angeles’s, and that, yeah, that it’s a punchline for anyone who isn’t from there and for a lot of people who are.  When I was 17, my friends and I drove down to Atlanta for the Olympics, and one day we ended up a little lost in a pretty rough neighborhood and a tough-looking, bigger-than-all-of-us guy noticed and came over to confront us with what looked to me at the time like a pretty sinister smile.  “Y’all look lost,” he said.  “Where y’all boys from?”  When we replied “Detroit,” he stepped back and said “whoa!”, clearly at that point kind of kidding, but that’s our reputation.  In a world where image is everything, Detroit has an unshakably bad image.  But home is where the heart is.  There’s no place like home.  I can only “say nice things about Detroit” as the t-shirt taught me.

You know about Detroit’s crime.  You know about Detroit’s bankruptcy.  You know about Detroit’s reputation.  I want to tell you about Detroit, my home.

How can I best describe Detroit?  A couple years ago I dated a girl whose sister had Down Syndrome.  And when she’d talk about her sister her face would light up with a giant smile, that same big, authentic, involuntary smile I get when people ask me about Detroit.  And what I took from the way she talked and smiled and laughed and felt about her sister was this – it was in no way contrived or fake joy; it was in no way pity directed at her sister.  It was a combination of pity for those who could never get past the surface of her sister to fully recognize and appreciate how wonderful she was, and joy that she herself was one of the few people who got to fully enjoy such an incredible person.

I feel pretty similarly about Detroit.  For those of us who grew up there, who call it home, Detroit is a great place that we both regret that no one will really understand and that we secretly love that it’s *ours*.  It has its problems, far too many to name in one blog post, and it will never have the outside allure that Paris and San Francisco and Miami have.  But it’s home, and it’s the only place I’ll ever call that.  Welcome to my Detroit.

October, 2006.  Venice, California.  My brother and I are at a bar watching the Detroit Tigers in the World Series. I’ve lived in Los Angeles for two months; he’s visiting.  To our left is a Venice Beach drug dealer; he’s wearing a navy blue hat with an Olde English D.  To our right is a real-life Axel Foley from Beverly Hills Cop.  He’s a Detroit homicide detective on vacation in California; he’s wearing a navy blue hat with an Olde English D.  All four of us are.  I ask the cop what part of Detroit he’s from and he tells me Brightmoor, a notably rough section of the city that may well have the highest murder rate.  Now I know what’s coming next and I’m a little embarrassed.  I’m from the suburbs, a New England looking middle class town called Plymouth, about 15 miles from the city limits of Detroit.  “West suburbs,” I reply.  “Plymouth, out by Ann Arbor.”  It’s only in my head but he looks at me a little funny; earlier in the conversation I had definitely said I was from “Detroit.”  “But out of town I always say Detroit,” I follow up.  A little drunk and a little embarrassed I meekly ask “is that okay?”.  Shaking my hand with a big smile on his face he says “Preferred.”  

They say that it’s not where you are that counts, but who you’re with. And that’s the main reason I love Detroit.  As I type this – on an 80-degree January day in Los Angeles – I’m wearing my “Detroit vs. Everybody” sweatshirt.  There’s pride in being the underdog – we’re all in it together.  When I see another Detroit Tigers hat here in Los Angeles, it’s just instinct to smile and say hello and know that it’s coming right back to you; when I’m home in Michigan everyone says hello or good morning and if there’s any reason to be collectively happy – a nicer day than the day before, a win for a local team, a great live band – you’ll comment to a stranger about it as you pass on the street or hold open the door.  It took leaving Detroit to realize that that’s not always the case, that it’s normal for neighbors to avoid eye contact, to not share in the joy of a gorgeous fall day or a major triumph for a local entity.

This summer I was back home and my dad and I rode racing bikes from Plymouth down Hines Drive – a 25+ mile park system that runs through Wayne County – into Detroit, a couple suburbanites in lycra doing yuppie things.  At Outer Drive, entering “actual Detroit” some construction workers were paving the shoulder and working caution and Stop signs to control  traffic in a single lane.  As we rode through, a native Detroiter shifted his Caution sign to his other hand to hold up a high five – “you’re doing great…go get ’em!” he yelled as we slapped hands.  Total strangers from different worlds united by a beautiful day and civic pride, compelled to share that enthusiasm together.  That’s Detroit.

A couple weeks ago I was home for the Christmas in an incredibly cold couple of weeks that culminated in the Polar Vortex.  Through family some free tickets came through for the Old Timers game of the NHL Winter Classic – an outdoor hockey game in 10-degree weather in downtown Detroit.  Downtown was packed; people dressed as warmly as they could and threw caution to the wind, for there was a big event with local legends and as the song goes there ain’t no mountain high enough, ain’t no vortex cold enough to keep Detroiters from a big gathering of fellow Detroiters.  As we eventually dodged the crowd a little early to get to a midtown microbrewery before the rush, my family took a moment to soak it all in.  Tens of thousands of people spending all day outside on one of the coldest days of the year, just to be together for a game that didn’t even count.  That’s Detroit.

I currently live in Los Angeles.  So does just about every celebrity in the world, with the remaining fraction living in New York or London.  You know who doesn’t?  Eminem.  Kid Rock.  Bob Seger.  The Detroit crowd stays home.  Even our prodigal daughter, Madonna, has been adamant that she wants to send *her* daughter to the University of Michigan.  And while we’re talking music consider the example of “Searching for Sugarman’s” Sixto Rodriguez.  He was Bob Dylan at the time when Bob Dylan became Elvis Presley, but when he didn’t get the breaks he rolled up his sleeves and worked construction and demolition.  And he was happy.  40 years later he’s a world-famous touring musician for songs that Sixto wrote in the Sixties.  And he hasn’t changed a bit.  That’s Detroit.

It’s not surprising that the owner of the Detroit Tigers and Detroit Red Wings, Mike Illitch, continues to buy up real estate in Detroit to rebuild downtown.  He’s responsible for much of the riverfront development near Joe Louis Arena and he basically created the “Foxtown” area a few miles north on Woodward, buying the Fox Theatre and then building Comerica Park for the Tigers across the street, leaving space for the Ford family to build Ford Field next door.  But do you know which NBA owner is buying up Detroit real estate like an ADHD Trump?  Not from the Detroit Pistons – it’s Cleveland Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert.  Why? Because he’s from Metro Detroit, and Detroit needs an infusion of capital and entrepreneurial spirit. Some people dream of becoming billionaires to offshore their money and vacations to the Caymans; some people dream of becoming millionaires to invest in Detroit.

Detroit does common good.  While local American governments were turning firehoses and Dobermans on African-Americans during the Civil Rights Movement, Berry Gordy used Detroit as a launching pad for Motown Records, sending the sounds of Smokey Robinson and Aretha Franklin and Stevie Wonder through the airwaves as an example of what could be.  When FDR signed the Lend-Lease Act in 1939, tying the fate of a nation in Great Depression to the fate of the western world in World War II, the Detroit automakers converted operations into the Arsenal of Democracy, producing the artillery to win the war and manufacture the nation out of depression.

My city is no stranger to bankruptcy; in the 1980s one of the Big 3 automakers – Chrysler – flirted with it as the country exited the oil and inflation crises of the 1970s.  Chrysler responded by introducing the mass market to the minivan and the SUV (also the K-car, but let’s not talk about that).  More recently one of our decorated athletes – basketball star Derrick Coleman – went bankrupt, and not in the humiliating way that many hoop stars lose it all.  Derrick took the money he earned as a star with the Nets and 76ers and other teams and made a goal – invest in just one block near his old house and try to revitalize the neighborhood with a restaurant, a convenience store, an arcade, a video store.  It didn’t work, and DC lost about everything, but he tried. You may say he’s a dreamer, but he’s not the only one.  When Detroiters get money, we try to reinvest near home – Gilbert has his buildings, Illitch has his, Jalen Rose has his Leadership Academy, Kid Rock bought the “Made in Detroit” brand to keep it going.  And I have my “stimulus plan” – my friends laugh but when I go home I like to spend a little extra money.  Nothing extravagant, but if I should get a haircut I’ll wait a few weeks to time it until I can get it in Michigan; if I need to buy socks or underwear I’ll time it to buy in Detroit.  And when I’m with friends at a bar or restaurant I love picking up an extra round or a tab with money not earned in Michigan – my little stimulus plan to add a little something to the local economy.  Again, you may say I’m a dreamer but I know I’m not the only one.  That’s Detroit.

On Eminem’s most recent album he dropped the lyric “Maybe that’s why I can’t leave Detroit; it’s the motivation that keeps me going.  This is the inspiration I need; I could never turn my back on a city that made me.”

Kid Rock’s best quote, from when he was asked why he broke up with a supermodel girlfriend, was “Some people like to drink champagne in Paris; some people like to drink Budweiser in Detroit.”

But maybe it’s an obscure Kanye “Mid” West (he’s from Chicago) lyric that summarizes my feelings about Detroit most.  He’s talking about the black community – “black excellence, baby” is his refrain – and even if you’ve heard it this line is pretty forgettable other than the sincere, genuine emphasis with which he says it and emphasizes the collective noun:  “I love *us*.”

I’ve tried my best to defend the weather and I truly believe it’s a good thing even if took moving to perma-summer to appreciate it.  And other parts of Detroit are even harder to glorify to outsiders – the crime and corruption within the city, the bankruptcy, the population and migration trends.  But Detroit is more than socioeconomic statistics and global manufacturing trends and sociological research.  Detroit is people, and it’s some of the friendliest, most sincere, most hardworking people in the world.  I love us.  I love Detroit.  There’s no place like home.

October 25, 2013.  8 days before Ironman Florida.

Markus (my boss, who’s fascinated by endurance sports training programs):  So…your last weekend before the race.  You’re tapering – what are your workouts this weekend?

Me: I’ll back off to one workout a day and relatively short.  Probably a 14-mile run on Saturday and a 2 or 2.5 hour bike on Sunday.

Markus (laughing): I see those 13.1 stickers everywhere.  You realize that people put stickers on their car for doing your taper workouts, right?

This is a tough post to write.  People have asked me to write about Ironman and I’ve never been sure how to write it.  Mainly because of things like that conversation.  Now, I’m insanely proud of finishing Ironman triathlons.  I love going to swim workouts or group bike rides or 10Ks and having people see my Ironman tattoo and come up to talk about it.  I love that it’s a dream for people – it was and still is for me, too – and that if you have tear ducts, a TV, and a soul you’ve probably cried watching NBC’s Ironman coverage each winter.  But I hate the idea that Ironman makes anyone feel less accomplished for their finish lines.  I hate when people apologize for or downplay their endurance races with that caveat “I know it’s no Ironman, but…”  And I actually think this is an important part of the whole Ironman story.  So let me start here.

When I smile at the notion that people put stickers on their cars for finishing fractions of an Ironman, it’s not at all because I don’t respect that accomplishment.  I do – I’ve finished just as many half-marathon races in my life as full Ironmans (3 of each). And all of them were hard.  I’d say that three finish lines stand out as the most amazing feelings of my life: my first marathon (Chicago, 2001); qualifying for the Boston Marathon (at the Bayshore Marathon in Traverse City, Michigan in 2005), and my first Ironman (Ironman Texas in 2011).  And they all have one thing in common – they were the exact moments that what had always seemed like a dream to me became real.  They were all dreams come true.

The distance didn’t matter as much, the time I spent training or racing or holding on for dear life as muscles fatigued and self-doubt crept in didn’t matter.   It was about setting a lofty goal, working like crazy to accomplish it, daring to dream big, and seeing it through to that final step.  26.2 or 140.6, all those finish lines felt the exact same.  A fraction of me thought I could do it and willed the rest of me to make it happen.  All finish lines, all dreams, matter.  And I think I speak for almost all Ironmen in that.

The fact that an Ironman contains a full marathon, the fact that my rest days are sticker-worthy to lots of people, that doesn’t belittle half-marathons or marathons or “metric century” 62-mile rides at all.  Ironmen don’t disrespect those distances in any way – in fact, I hold those numbers in high regard.  That’s what makes Ironman Ironman.  It’s not “a long triathlon” – it’s the blending of some insane races in their own right into one “I can’t believe I’m doing this” day.  2.4 miles is a monster swim.  Riding a full century – 100 miles – and then tacking on 12 more for good measure is straight insanity.  And to quote Boston-accented Julie Andrews about 26.2 – fah is a long, long way to run.  Ironman doesn’t make those distances less significant; Ironman is what it is because those distances are so incredible.  And any time you push your finish line further or faster than you imagined possible, that’s amazing.

Around the same time, earlier this month, that I finished my third Ironman, Justin Bieber was in the news for falling asleep while a prostitute in Brazil posted pictures of their dalliance to Twitter.  And hear me out – the two events are actually kind of related.  I finished my first marathon at age 23 and it was an unbelievable experience.  I bought the race jacket and wore it everywhere.  I wore marathon t-shirts to every 10K I could find for months after.  My office had a sendoff and a welcome-back party for me and I soaked it all in.  Then I ran two more, finally lowering my time.  Then I got serious and dropped over 10 minutes, then over 20 minutes off of that, and then I saw Boston in my sights and took a couple swings and finally qualified and raced it well.  All by age 27.   And Biebs?  By the time he was 16 he could walk into any cheerleading practice or homecoming dance in the world and leave with the captain and the queen…both if they were different people.  Within months he probably realized he could do the same thing with sorority houses, Miss America pageants, and Playboy mansions.  So he’s out there pushing the limits – albeit in strange, strange ways – and that’s what led me to Ironman, too.

Maybe a better analogy is that old Rodney Dangerfield line “I”d never stoop so low as to join a club that would stoop so low as to accept me as a member.”  Once you dream the impossible dream and see it come true, eventually it becomes the new normal and you need to dream a new one.  It doesn’t invalidate the old one – for Bieber, Selena Gomez is still straight up gorgeous and for me, I don’t know that I’ll ever be as truly proud of myself as I was when I crossed that finish line in Grant Park in 2001 – but instead in a way it’s a celebration of it.  You want that feeling of (kind of anti-Dangerfield) joining another elite fraternity, another elite realm that you never dreamed of.  26.2, 140.6, ultramarathon, Appalachian Trail, Everest…it’s not the actual finish line that matters.  It’s that you have your eyes on a finish line.  Ironman, right now, is mine.

May 21, 2011.  The Woodlands, TX.  Sometime around 3:30pm, somewhere in the relative shade of a handful of trees that only Charlie Brown could love.

“How are you holding up?” she says, hand on my shoulder as she shuffles past.  I’ve slowed to a walk again, soaking in the tiny bit of shade and breeze for just a second.  Already today I’ve swam farther than I ever have without at least stopping at a wall for an interval and biked farther than I’ve ever biked period.  I’m about 5 miles into a marathon, and although I’ve run several of those the highest temperature I’ve ever run one in may have gotten near 85 degrees but only barely, as that one (Chicago 2010) started at 7am on a day that maxed at 85.  It’s now, depending on which bank display thermometer you believe, about 95 degrees and the sun is still high in the sky. I’m not sure I have anything in the tank, but I’m only about 21 miles away from the finish line, a finish line that you have to start 140.6 miles away from and register for a year’s worth of training in advance.  After she’s run by I finally recognize her; she’s from my dinner table at the athlete welcome dinner two nights prior.  She and her husband – they’re from Austin –  have each done 4 or 5 of these. And he’s the one who, seeing my Boston Marathon t-shirt*, told me what keeps them coming back.  “I’ve done Boston.  I’ve done the New York Marathon.  I’ve climbed famous mountains and raced famous bike courses.  And I’ve done several Ironman races.  Only Ironman still gives me goosebumps.  This is your first one and it’s scary as hell; this is my (let’s say fifth) and it’s still scary as hell.  But that’s why it’s fun.  You’ll finish, I’ll finish, and we’ll see each other at another welcome dinner.  But regardless of when it is we’ll still have goosebumps.  That’s why we’re all here.”  

Finally recognizing who she is I pick up my pace.  I want her to know.  I want her to know that I recognize her and appreciate her support, but more than that I want to know her that I’ll see her at the finish line.  “Feeling good,” I say.  “21 miles from a dream come true.”  She’s slowing to walk.  I’m running again.

Some people do Ironman because they’re ultra-competitive.  Some comment wherever they are – in line for bike check-in, in line for pre-race porta-potties in Transition, at the welcome dinner or awards banquet – that you have to be “Type Triple A” to do an Ironman.

I love Ironman because, to me, it’s “above” competitive.  Because we’re all competing against ourselves, against our own hopes and fears and hiccups in training and worries about mechanical trouble on the bike and nagging hamstrings/ankles/knees/IT-bands; because we’re all competing against our own time goals and just-finish goals. Because we’re all in it together.

Today’s NBC Ironman telecast started like they do every year, with Al Trautwig commenting over a scene of pre-dawn in Kona with athletes going through body-marking in the dark, pumping tires and lubing chains and taking deep breaths and stopping to meditate or pray or reflect for a second.  Every year Al Trautwig asks the same profound question well before the sun comes up and the gun fires and the pros hit the water.  “By midnight tonight the athletes will all have their answers, but we must ask the supreme question,” he says, then pauses for effect and says with a surprised tone.  “Why?  Why train for a full year to put your body through 2.4 miles of swimming, 112 miles on the bike, and then finish it off for a marathon.  Why?”

My why?  I want to be one of them.  I want to be an Ironman.  Long-term, the answer is complicated, or at least long winded.  But if you’re at all considering it, if it’s at all in that deep recess of your “someday, maybe, in an ideal world if I had everything else in place and more time to train, I’ve always thought it would be kind of cool to cross that finish line and hear those words – Brian, you are an Ironman – someday” dreamer mentality, go see an Ironman.  Talk to someone with an Ironman jacket or tattoo or t-shirt.  Ironman is the coolest fraternity I can think to join.  Springsteen may have written it for Obama but it applies to Ironman it applies to anything: “We take care of our own.”

Endurance athletes tend to be introverts, so the displays of camaraderie and teamwork can be subtle, but they’re profound. The distance is so extreme, the training is so intense, the day itself is so grueling, and most importantly the finish line itself trumps the clock  and finish order so emphatically that we’re all in it together.  If there’s a feeling better than your own finish line – that last 200 or so yards when you can see the line and you’re among the cheering crowd and Mike Reilly is preparing to say your name and tell you what you’ve waited 140.6 miles to hear – Brian Galvin from Santa Monica, California…you…are….an Ironman! – it’s the finish line in the 11:00 to midnight hour.  You start at 7am and you have exactly 17 hours – until midnight – to finish.  Most of us come in between maybe 12 and 14 hours, by 9pm.  A long, grueling day.  But most of us who have already finished, recovered, and showered come back around 11 for that last hour to cheer in – to will in – those who need all 17.  And it’s electric.

The scene?  Spectators galore, dancing to cheesy club music, clapping and stomping and pounding the bleachers and finishing barricades in rhythm.  Athletes limping their way back, stressing their sore leg muscles to balance on flimsy bleachers and dance with everyone else.  And every time a potential finisher is in sight, the roar builds until we yell in unison with the announcer…You Are…An Ironman! As the world has gotten bigger and interests have gotten more segmented at least it’s my opinion that we’re less connected to each other.  We’ll never *all* watch the final episode or MASH or Roots together again; there will never be another Thriller album that *everyone* owns.  But within the Ironman community – spectators, athletes, and volunteers alike – that last hour is about as close as I’ve ever felt to strangers.  You want everyone to feel that moment of glory, and you want to celebrate it with everyone else that ever has.

The Ironman tradition is a tattoo once you’ve finished one, usually on the back of one of your calves so that other athletes can see it when you pass them on a bike or while running.  During your first Ironman you see hundreds of them on other athletes and they motivate you.  There’s a little envy but there’s more a sense of possibility and relief.   They’ve done it and they enjoyed it enough that they’re back for more.  I want to be one of them, and it’s possible.  And we’re all in this together.  We’re all part of the same team.

They had an awards banquet and athlete celebration event the day after that first Ironman.  Somehow I ended up at a table with most of my table from the welcome dinner, and we all shared war stories from the race.  My Austin friends mentioned, as only Ironman veterans can “we saw that deer in the headlights look on your face the other night, but we knew you’d get here,” adding that they had each seen me multiple  times on race day and felt energized that I – the first timer on our 36-hours-old “team” – was looking so strong.  “Thanks for the inspiration,” they said.  They didn’t have to add “now go out and pay it forward for other first-timers.”  I would, regardless.

Another guy at that table had come straight to the athlete banquet from the hospital.  He had finished the night before, visited the medical tent because he had felt dizzy, and they admitted him to give him full IV treatment for dehydration and exhaustion.  He hadn’t even enjoyed the finish line experience, but he came straight to the athlete party to talk to us all about it.  Six months later – while I was out supporting my dad at Ironman Florida – I bumped into him again, volunteering at *that* awards banquet.  He had already signed up for another Ironman and was volunteering at Florida to get first dibs on registration for that one, too.  We talked like long-lost college friends when in reality we had had one 30-minute meal together lifetime, while he was just leaving the hospital and we were both exhausted like crazy.  It didn’t matter; by that point we were teammates for life.

November 2, 2013.  Mile 105 of the bike.  About 1:45pm.  Panama City, FL.

I’m looking over my shoulder repeatedly.  There’s a cyclist about to pass me and I want to know where he is in case I have to swing wide for a turn or to avoid a pothole or crack in the road.   There’s a massive tailwind and although my quads are aching and my butt is sore from 100+ miles on a bike seat (and my reproductive system has been numb for miles, but Anna Kendrick if you’re reading this it’s back!  Plus I have a really cool medal I could show you…) I’m feeling pretty good with 7 miles until I can kick out of my pedals and get off this godforsaken (and expensive…tri bikes ain’t cheap) bike seat.

Him: You’re clear…I’m just cheating for a minute.   But at least I’m honest, right?  (“drafting” is illegal in Ironman competition, but this late in the race I doubt any referees are looking)

Me: Ah, it’s only cheating if you get caught, right?  And it’s all tailwind…there’s nothing to draft.  Beautiful day for a ride, eh?

Him: Great day.  Really nice course and this tailwind is a great way to finish.

Me: I’m thinking about going for a run when we’re done.  You interested?

Him: Oh, for sure.  Along the beach?  Maybe 20 miles or so?  Or why don’t we just call it an even marathon?

The worst part of an Ironman usually comes somewhere between mile 90 and mile 110 of the bike.  The swim can be choppy and crowded, but it’s over so early in the day that you forget about it well before the halfway point of the bike.  And in a way it’s therapeutic…you’ve been stressing about the race for weeks, you slept maybe 2 hours in fits and starts the night before, and you got to Transition at least 90 minutes before the race started.  The swim is your first opportunity to blow off all of that nervous energy, and since half the goal is to preserve energy for the rest of the race you’re doing a lot of drafting and gliding.  The swim passes quickly, at least in retrospect.  And the run…if anything it regresses to what they call the “Ironman Shuffle”, a slow run-walk, step-by-step to the finish line.  If you made the bike cutoff you still have 6+ hours to get to the finish line to call yourself a finisher.  You’ll get there even if you have to crawl.  But mile 100 of the bike can be rough.  You’ve forgotten mostly about the swim but it happened, and 2.4 miles is an insane workout.  And you’ve ridden your bike farther than most ever will and you’re *almost* done.  The finish line is in sight, but then you have to START a marathon.  For most of the bike you’re only thinking about the bike, but as soon as you let yourself think about the end of the bike – when you’re nearing 100, when you pass 100, when you hand your bike to a volunteer at T2 and they point you to the tent to go change shoes to run – it hits you.  There’s a full marathon to go.  It’s mid-afternoon, you’ve already worked out harder than 98% of the population ever will, and you have to start a marathon.

People often ask “how do you do an Ironman?” or express disbelief at the consecutive distances.  And I think what they’re really after is that moment.  How do you deal with that one moment when you’ve already pushed your body past exhaustion, when you’ve already dug deeper than you knew you could dig to summon the energy to get past the doldrums of miles 60-90 of the bike to get toward that bike finish, and you realize you’re nowhere near done?  Two phrases come to mind – the military’s “embrace the suck” and Nike’s “just do it”.  Honestly, you just do it.  And once you’re a veteran – once you know that it’s more than ‘possible’, it’s ‘probable’ or even ‘definite’ – you embrace the suck.  You laugh it off and invite the guy on the bike next to you to “go for a run”.  But first?  You just do it.

The beauty of the middle of an Ironman – the start and finish lines are the true beauty, but there’s an aesthetic quality to that “athlete’s only” despair/opportunity zone between mile 90 of the bike and the exit of T2 and the run once you’re past the euphoria of the crowds,  too…a beauty that you can only know if you’ve done it – is in the yeoman nature of it.  It’s a lunchpail and shovel attitude…you really only think about the enormity of it a few times, mainly like I said when you’re nearing the end of the bike.  For most of the race your goals are short.  The next aid station. The next corner.  Catching that cute girl ahead of you.

One of my favorite music stories is one I heard on an LA radio station a few years ago.  A guy had bumped into Jackson Browne at an event and wanted to tell him how much his music had influenced him.  “Your music, Jackson – it’s a soundtrack to my life.  I hope you know…you’re the backdrop to meeting my wife, you played at my wedding, I sang your songs to my baby daughter.  You’re the soundtrack of my family’s life.”  And Jackson replied “Too big, man.  Too big.  All I did was sing some songs.”  That’s pretty true of Ironman, too – while Jackson Browne may have been the soundtrack to many of our lives, he can’t think of the enormity of that, and while you’re on mile 103 of the bike of mile 8 of the run you can’t think of the enormity of the whole race, either.  He just wrote some songs; you just put one foot in front of the other.  And what’s amazing to me?  You just do it.  You set smaller goals: you run to the next corner, you run until you count to 100 and then you bargain with yourself to do it again.  You sing song lyrics – maybe some Jackson Browne “Running on Empty” as a soundtrack – and transport your mind away from the grandiosity of the task.  And since you’ve committed yourself to getting there, you get there.

First Sunday of November, 2003; exactly 10 years before I raced Ironman Florida.  Staten Island, NY, in line for a port-a-potty at the start line of the New York City Marathon.

I’m standing with my dad, the second time we’ve been together for the start of a marathon. In a few minutes P. Diddy will cut to the front of our line and use our port-a-potty.  Right now we’re talking to a shopkeeper from the Bronx.  

Him: You’re father and son?

Us: We are.

Him: I’d give anything to run a marathon with one of my kids.  I don’t see my kids much; I wasn’t much of a father but I still love them.  For a time maybe I loved drugs a little more.  But then I woke up one day and looked in the mirror.  Maybe 10 years ago.  I was 50 pounds overweight, at least.  I had been on a binge and couldn’t remember what day it was.  I didn’t know where my family was.  I knew I had to change.

Us: (summoning Jackson Browne) Wow.

Him: I was a mess, but running saved me.  I set a goal, whether it was run a mile or run to the river.  And the next day I did it.  And then I ran further the next day.  I got clean and my running goals helped me.  And I tried to make things right with my family. Running cleared my head and gave me a purpose.  I wouldn’t be alive today if I weren’t here today – I wouldn’t have survived if I didn’t have running, if I didn’t dream about running the New York Marathon.  But I would love someday to run it with my son.  You guys are lucky. I hope you know that.

Us: Wow, that’s amazing.  And we do know…this is a lot of fun.  We hope you do get that opportunity.

Him: And think about this: the best runners in the world are running today.  We’re starting at the same start line as them, running the same course as them.  What other sport in the world do they let you do that?  Can you just go play golf against Tiger Woods?  Can you step on the court with Michael Jordan?  What a sport.  We run against the best in the world…

At my first Ironman expo, I playfully talked trash with Chris Lieto, a pro who had come in second at the World Championships.  He was signing autographs and I saw the tent and walked over.  He asked if I wanted one and I laughed and said “no, actually we’re in the same age group.  I just came to say good luck.”  He laughed and after we talked a couple minutes he said “I like you…you seem like a good competitor.  I’ll look out for you – what’s your race number?”.  I said “969” and he got a cocky smile and said “cool…I’m bib number 1” (the highest seed number).  We shook hands; I didn’t see him on race day.

At my second Ironman, I raced my dad, who was doing his third.  The day I registered for Ironman Coeur d’Alene I texted him “IMCDA – registered!”.  Minutes later he replied “Me too”.  It was on.  I’m a better swimmer even adjusting for the age factor; he’s a slightly better cyclist, and we’re both experienced marathoners.  All day, every turnaround, I’d see him not that far behind me.  I couldn’t let my dad beat me; my body said slow down, walk, but I couldn’t.  I saw him walking when I was around 15 miles into the run and that was the first time – not all day, but in my life – I saw him back down (I should put that in quotes…he still finished a freaking Ironman in under 14 hours).  I waited until I had turned a corner but at least a hundred yards, and finally let myself walk.

At my third Ironman, I was about 9 miles into the run when I saw a familiar-looking face pass me.  I looked closer – she had a seeded, professional number. It was Mirinda Carfrae, who the month prior (last month, actually) had won the Ironman World Championship. She’s the reigning world champion, the best in the world.  I picked up my pace and ran next to her for the next half-mile.  Admittedly, she was on her second loop of the marathon course and I was on my first, and having just won worlds she wasn’t racing hard. But still…  After a half-mile I realized this was probably a little creepy to run stride-for-stride, shoulder-to-shoulder with her, so I lightly patted her on the back and said “Thanks for letting me say I ran with the best in the world for a while”.  She looked back, a little surprised, and said “Thanks for saying that”.

At my fourth Ironman, this coming July in Lake Placid, I’ll race my dad again.  This time he texted me on registration day “IMLP – I’m in”.  These things sell out in minutes.  I was at work.  I dropped everything, got on the website, and snagged a spot.  “Me too – it’s on” I texted back.  My dad has done 3, I’ve done 3, and one of them was together.  My mom has been to all of them; my grandmother and aunt have been to four of the five.  My sister has been to two. And some of the best in the world have raced with us.  It’s a family affair and it’s a world-class event.  That’s Ironman.

I’ve got ice in my veins, blood in my eyes, hate in my heart, love in my mind.  I’ve seen nights full of pain, days of the same, you keep the sunshine, save me the rain.  I search but never find, hurt but never cry, I work and forever try but I’m cursed so nevermind.  And it’s worse but better times seem further and beyond.  The top gets higher the more that I climb. The spot gets smaller, but I get bigger.  Try to get in where I fit in, no room for a ***** but soon for a ***** it be on mother****** but all this bullshit made me strong mother****** – Lil Wayne

It hurts but you’ll never know, this pain I’ll never show.  If only you can see just how lonely and how cold, and frostbit I’ve become.  My back’s against the wall.  When push comes to shove I just stand up and scream f*** them all.   -Eminem

All the above from “Drop the World”.  

Where do you begin to describe Ironman training?  In many ways it’s more of a logistical hassle than a physical toil, if that makes sense.  It just takes a ton of time, and you need pool time, clear roads to bike on, and in lieu of clear roads or daylight you need entertainment for indoor bike trainer rides of an hour up to even 6 or 7.  But like that 100-mile point on the bike, there’s also that mental hurdle to conquer – when you’re riding 50 miles on a Saturday morning you often have to deal with the realization that you have to run when you’re done, then rest and wake up Sunday morning to swim in the morning and bike in the afternoon.  It’s relentless.

A typical mid-training schedule?  4 of the 5 weekday nights you’re doing a 90-minute to 2-hour workout.  One of those nights may be a 2 to 3 mile swim, but if the pool is crowded you’re stuck doing a monster swim early on one of the weekend mornings.  One of those nights you’ll run between 8 and even 12 miles.  The others are probably trainer rides – up to 2 hours while watching Monday Night Football or a college basketball game on ESPN or DVRed episodes of Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune – anything to keep your mind occupied while you grind out miles.  On weekends you usually need to get 2 disciplines per day; I like bike/run on Saturday and swim/bike on Sunday.  If I’m working out on Friday nights – my “rest day” is a floater during the week…sometimes I use it for work (picking up some bike money by tutoring or substitute teaching for the test prep company I work for), other times it’s to hit happy hour with friends or to try to take a girl out, and other times it’s because I’m sitting on the couch in bike shorts or running shoes just totally incapable of summoning the energy to get going, and that leads to an 8pm passout on the couch.

The idea is to get up to 15-20 hours a week of workouts, which sounds almost doable until you realize that 4 nights a week of even 2 hours each night only gets you to 8.  You have to grind weekends, and more than the physical you learn mental toughness…the fortitude to lace up those shoes and go, to answer that alarm clock, to entertain yourself when you’ve been grinding for hours.  Those “Drop the World” lyrics?  Spot on.  All this BS just made me strong MFer, you have to tell yourself while the top gets higher the more that you climb.  But there’s some amazing stuff in there, too – I’ve had days when someone in my mind a 20-mile run was a “rest day”, enough that on my way out the door I shunned sunblock because “it’s not a big deal” (and then proceeded to get torched).  There are days in the pool when you watch from underwater as the early-morning crew leaves and the fashionably-late crowd arrives, and then leaves, before you come up for air.  There are the people that report seeing you out running or biking, and do so so frequently that you seem like a superhero or neighborhood fixture: how are you always running anytime they’re in an out of the neighborhood?

Maybe it’s Stockholm Syndrome but I swear you miss the training after the race.  There’s a pride in that discipline and a feeling of accomplishment and the corresponding easy sleep that comes after it all the time.  I’m two weeks post-Iron right now and tomorrow I’ll swim in the morning and bike on the trainer for all of Sunday Night Football.  I can’t let it slip too much.  It’s so much easier to stay in shape than to get in shape that once you’re there you never want to let it go.

And maybe that brings me back to the beginning.  Why Ironman?  Why endurance sports?  Because for years you dream about that finish line and you put yourself through hell to get there, regardless of whether that finish line is 26.2 or 140.6 or anything in between or beyond.  And 10 miles before the finish line, or 4 weeks before the finish line, you swear you’ll never do it again.  The finish line is exactly that – the finish.  But there’s something magical about that finish line.  Those truly-memorable finish lines – usually the firsts but also the fastests and the other favorites – inevitably lead to the next start line.  The endorphins at that finish line put anything Heisenberg and Pinkman can cook to shame; the first hit is free but then the rest of your life you’re chasing that high, in large part because now you know you can achieve it.  When the impossible becomes possible, then probable, you push the limits of possible even farther.  That’s why I’m an Ironman, and that’s why I keep coming back for more.

October, 2001. The Chicago Marathon Finish Line, Chicago, IL.

Her family, outside the fencing that surrounded the finish line:  You did it!  You did it!

Her (the first time marathon finisher who finished just next to me, seconds ago): I did it!  (searching for words…looking an amazing combination of proud, relieved, and surprised)  I’m…I’m awesome!

She is.  We are.  And we all can be.