If you were driving around Tuesday night listening to the Red Wings game on radio -- and as it turns out, that could be the last hockey game of the year -- you might have heard a segment between periods called "Spotlight on Amateur Hockey." It's an odd little program in which announcer Budd Lynch, with his deep, resonant voice, talks to kids about their hockey, in this case a 13-year-old:"So . . . I see you play defenseman.""Yeah.""Do you enjoy that position?""Uh-huh.""How's your coach?'"He's good."
LEXINGTON, Ky. -- The first newspaper I ever worked for, where I earned as much money as your average beggar, was also the first place I faced The Old-Young Thing. It didn't last long. Just long enough for the publisher, a fat man with a goatee, to bring in a tall fellow whom, he told me, "will be the editor from now on."This bothered me, mostly because, until that moment, I was the editor. (It was a tiny newspaper; being editor only meant you got a desk.) But what really bothered me was that this fellow, who was otherwise a nice guy, turned out to be younger than me.
LEXINGTON, Ky. -- Who you calling young? Who you calling freshmen? The team that was supposed to show its immaturity, the team that was supposed to have a squeaky voice, the team that was due to get its comeuppance when it finally faced a "real" challenger in this tournament, just sent that real challenger on a very real summer vacation, it now has three victories under its belt in college basketball's biggest tournament -- supposed to be for big boys only -- and tomorrow it will play Ohio State for the right to go to the promised land, the Final Four.Who you calling young?
SAN DIEGO -- A guy with a tape recorder around his neck was crouched low. Above him were at least a dozen long-stemmed microphones. Behind them, TV cameras, humming in unison. And tucked in between, maybe 100 sports writers, craning their necks. The focus of their attention was a chair. Dexter Manley's chair. It was empty."They're interviewing a chair?" someone asked.
LEXINGTON, Ky. -- You find me in the basement, under a long-haired wig, strumming a guitar in front of a video camera."What's up?" you ask."WAYNE'S WORLD! WAYNE'S WORLD!""I beg your pardon?" you say.Come on. I am preparing. We all should be preparing. By "we," I mean people who are over 30, and, therefore, soon to be put out to pasture."What are you talking about?" you say."Michigan," I say glumly.
Who is that guy? What's keeping him up there, floating toward the -- look there he goes again, up and slam! -- he's gotta be jet-propelled or something. He comes out of nowhere, and then -- wait, there he goes again uuuuuppppp annnnnd slam! Whooee! Those long arms, the grip, the way he sucks the ball in then floats toward the hoop. He just hangs there, waiting, living in the breeze. He looks so natural, so right.
Mitch Albom writes about running an orphanage in impoverished Port-au-Prince, Haiti, his kids, their hardships, laughs and challenges, and the life lessons he’s learned there every day.
