If nothing else, it is great theater and, to me, no one captured it
like a sports columnist named
Sandy Grady. He was quick-witted and
sharp-tongued, and his energetic sentences practically exploded off
the page. He was funny, smart, and opinionated. I was
captivated.
In
Michigan, where I spent my adolescence, I felt the same way
about another sports columnist, Joe Falls. Poor Joe. Somehow I
found his home number (was it really listed?) and called him late
one night after my high-school
basketball team defeated a team he
maintained would demolish us. "Joe Falls?" I asked when he picked
up the phone. "Yeah?" he growled, sleepily. I couldn't believe it:
This was really him. I was so nervous I could hardly speak, but I
was able to blurt out something about him being a know-nothing and
we showed him and ha-ha. "Good for you," he said, and hung up. I
don't know what I expected. But I stood there in the phone booth
feeling suddenly like a complete idiot.
When your high-school sports team achieves some miraculous victory,
you hug and kiss your girlfriend or high-five your buddies. How
many high schoolers call a sports columnist to gloat? Man, I wanted
to be that columnist.
And now I am. Not that one, specifically. But … one.
People ask me all the time, "Where do you get your ideas?"
Newspapers are a great source, but I can't use everything I come
across. One story I intended to write about, but never got around
to was a university study that concluded women are more emotional
than men (which seemed to me like, uh, duh, but I didn't want to
say so for fear of getting all sorts of angry letters; you may
write your letters now).