Friday, January 23, 2009

Going South

When the cat peed on his lap, it was like a slap to the face. He suddenly realized where he was, and why. He looked down and petted his terrified cat and quietly began to cry again.

Less than 24 hours earlier, he was a happy man, or at least a contented one. At that time he was relaxing on the City of New Orleans, heading home to see his wife for the first time in a month. The train was behind schedule, as usual, which meant he wouldn't be home until well after midnight. Knowing he'd have to be back on this train heading south on Sunday morning, every minute was precious to him. As the train crept through southern Mississippi, he planned his Saturday. He'd sleep late, then have his coffee by the backyard pond he'd dug before leaving for law school. He'd play with the cats awhile, and maybe take a walk in Overton Park. But above all, he'd get reacquainted with his wife. He'd remind himself of how her glasses tilted ever so slightly to one side, of the way she still drawled her 'A's while trying to hide her Alabama accent, even of the way her breath tasted in the morning. (It's odd, the things you find endearing after eleven years of marriage, he thought.) They'd go out to dinner at Automatic Slim's, their favorite restaurant. He even imagined that he might be able to talk her into some sort of sexual activity. It may be a short weekend, but it would be a lovely one.

He was half right, although it would become the longest short weekend of his life. It started when he came out of the train station and got into the idling car. He had hoped she'd be glad to see him, but instead she was angry about having to come downtown at 2:30 am to pick him up, as if it had been his fault that the train was late. In fact, she hadn't even bothered to dress beyond putting a coat over her nightgown, and wasn't even wearing her glasses. Well, that's why she didn't come in to meet the train, he thought. Then in the morning, when his offer to cook her breakfast was gruffly refused, he chalked it up to the lack of sleep. He decided to try to lighten the mood.

"Geez, anybody'd think you didn't love me," he said. It was something he'd said a thousand times before; she was not one to say "I love you," so this was his way of getting her to admit it.

"I wouldn't have married you if I didn't love you," was the reply he heard. She also had said this a thousand times before, only this morning that's not what she had said. What she actually had said was this: "I don't." Then she had begun to cry.

"What's the matter? Why are you crying?" he said, before it hit him. He looked at her blankly.

"I said I don't love you. I want a divorce."

Most of the rest of the day was lost in the fog that took over his brain, until the cat brought him back into the daylight world. He was being driven back to New Orleans, and she was doing the driving. She had refused to let him stay in the house and, lacking any other way for him to get back home ("back home," he now realized, was a phrase that meant exactly the opposite from the day before), they'd decided that she'd drive him there. Besides his weekend luggage, the only thing he'd taken with him was his cat, Charlie, a cat who had been with him since he was single, and who had (wisely, it now seemed) never warmed up to his wife. Her opinion of Charlie was not improved when his incontinence required her to pull over so her soon-to-be ex-husband could change his pants.

Back on the road, he switched on the car radio and tuned in the Alabama/Auburn football game. The silence was too painful; he needed a distraction. He could have tuned into the Michigan/Ohio St. game, since Michigan was his team, but her team was 'Bama and he knew she'd want to listen to the game. That's the kind of guy he was: understanding to a fault. Or maybe he was just accustomed to avoiding trouble. Maybe all those years of being understanding in order to avoid confrontation is what had led to that morning's denouement. Maybe...no. Stop. There'll be plenty of time for that later. Let's just get this day over first.

He made a couple of inocuous observations about the football game, both of which went unanswered, so he stopped. He noticed that again she wasn't wearing her glasses. "Did you get contacts?" he asked, mildly surprised that she'd never told him that was her plan. "Laser," came the terse reply. He suddenly realized that this had been in the works for quite some time. How long, he wondered?

When they arrived in New Orleans, he had to give her driving directions to his apartment. She didn't know the way. How long? Was this why she had been so enthusiastic about his idea to go to law school? At Thanksgiving dinner, nearly a year ago now, she had told everyone how proud she was of what he was doing, giving up a six-figure income to study law to help the indigent. He had been deeply moved by this surprising display, but now he thought it might have been a sham designed to ensure that he stick out the long tough one-L year. Maybe she didn't love him even then. Maybe she'd never really loved him, like he'd been saying in half-jest for a decade.

When they arrived at his Uptown flat, he asked if she'd like to come in and watch the second half before starting the five-hour return trip. He didn't really mean it; it's just the kind of thing he'd say without thinking. She just looked at him with a look of disbelief, with a little pity mixed in, and pulled away from the curb. Carrying the still-shaking Charlie, he went into his one bedroom patio apartment and pulled the door closed behind him.

And he was alone.

Thursday, January 22, 2009

Privacy

I frequently post on a website devoted to small college basketball, and in a post last night made mention that a player in a game I attended unexpectedly did not play. Today I received two messages, nearly simultaneous and entirely independent of one another, informing me that the player missed the game because he had received a significant medical diagnosis, and that he was therefore likely to miss more playing time, perhaps the entire season.

These notes, from well-intentioned people, have raised a number of ethical issues that I have yet to resolve.

The fact that the player in question will be out of action is unquestionably the public's business. Sporting events, even those of the small-college variety, become little more than vigorous exercise periods without fan support, and that takes publicity. The fans have a right, and a need, to know certain basic information, and that includes who is and is not available to play now and in the foreseeable future.

But I can't think of any reason why I need to know the reason he's not playing. I can think of any number of reasons a player could miss six weeks of college action. He could have a knee injury, he could have failed a class, he could have lost favor with the coach for a variety of reasons, or he could be ill. Whether any of these are true, or if the truth lies elsewhere, is extraneous to the only information to which I have a right: that he's out indefinitely.

Personal medical information is routinely spread about athletes, and I've never been quite comfortable about it. I'm even less comfortable when it's information about a 22-year-old student, one who will leave athletics behind him and join the "real world" in a few months. In the "real world," there's an ocean of difference between a knee injury and a dread disease. Suppose he applies for a job, and the prospective employer is a sports fan who, in that capacity, has learned of our subject's illness. Might she be less likely to extend a job offer to someone whose future health may be uncertain? Congress thought so when they passed employment anti-discrimination laws that prevent employers from asking applicants about such matters. Those laws also prevent employers from sharing medical information about their employees, but those laws don't seem to apply to sports organizations, or to colleges for that matter.

Just to complicate matters, one of the reports I received came from the parent of a player who found out from the stricken athlete himself. Leaving aside the veracity concerns that arise in such games of "telephone," does the athlete forfeit whatever privacy rights he may have had by having told a colleague? Assuming that he was aware that in so doing he was probably letting the cat out of the bag, can I infer that he wants people to know? That he'd rather have people know he's sick than make uninformed guesses about his grades or standing with the coach? Even if that's the case, does that give me the right to shout the story through my megaphone? I think the answer is clear; clear enough that I won't even publish the specifics in this blog, which is read only by friends, relatives, and spambots.

But it's not without effort on my part. I like being the source, the authority in my little corner of the sports world. The fact that I heard this story from two sources simultaneously, neither of whom has any good reason to be in possession of the information, suggests to me that the rumor is spreading like wildfire, and no good reporter wants to be caught behind the fireline. The temptation to grab the microphone and interrupt this program with a special news bulletin is nearly overwhelming. I want to be sympathetic and understanding and wish him well, but to do so in the most public forum I have at my disposal is really just a form of self-aggrandizement; the fact that it's based on private, personal information I shouldn't have possession of and have no right to share just makes it that much worse--and at the same time more tempting.

So I'll allow the story to go no further than my inbox, and in this sleepy corner of the internet merely will express my hope that the young man is able to thoroughly overcome his difficulties.

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Pitchers and Catchers Report in Three Weeks

There's about a foot of snow on the ground, even under what little canopy remains in the ravine. The overnight temperature has been in the single digits, with or without a minus sign, for a couple of weeks now. The entire landscape is a tabula rasa upon which new hopes and dreams can be projected. Conditions like these can only mean one thing: baseball season is just around the corner.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

44

Forgive me as I take a temporary two-day hiatus from posting. Yesterday I was at an all-day girls' basketball tournament, organized to honor Dr. Martin Luther King, a man who famously had a dream. Today I have been occupied with the inauguration of Barack Obama who, in becoming the 44th President of the United States, is if not the fulfillment of that dream, at least a significant milestone towards that fulfillment. Blogging takes a backseat. But here's a photo anyway.