She has 10 flatmates in her student housing at the University of Glasgow… that would double my current readership! So here goes….
Leah has been in college overseas for about 8 months now. During that time she has:
Lost her passport
Lost her Ohio ID
Lost her student ID
Lost the credit card tied to our account
Had her phone stolen
For Leah, those incidents have been aggravating. As a parent who is nearly 2,000 miles away (sorry, flatmates, I meant nearly 3,000 kilometers away), it’s super-frustrating.
But that’s all “stuff.” It can be replaced. It has been. What’s much more important is what she’s found during her “fresher” year of “uni.” (Man, these flatmates better appreciate how I’m adapting my vocabulary!)
She’s found friends. Ones who helped her with booking a hostel and a new flight when she had to stay a couple extra days in Krakow, Poland after she lost her passport there back in October.
Friends who made an American-style Thanksgiving feast when she was missing home in November.
Friends who will stay up until the wee hours to watch the Cincinnati team play in the Super Bowl… even though they think rugby is better.
Friends who invited her to their homes…. in London:
And in Derry:
Leah went swimming here.
She’s learned how to navigate unfamiliar cities in foreign countries.
St. Paddy’s Day… in Dublin!
She’s met people from all over the globe, and learned about different cultures.
She’s found that’s she’s capable of much more than she thought she was just 8 short months ago.
Our “baby” boy got his driver’s license yesterday morning, and went to his school’s prom last night.
2008 CR-V with 200K miles… rollin’ in style!
Just like that, we went from one phase of life to another. From Parent Uber to keeping your phone unsilenced and on the nightstand. Better the devil you know…
He’ll turn 17 in a month, so he’s a bit late to the driving game (thanks pandemic!). I’m fine with that. My auto insurance premium was fine with that too. He’s a cautious driver, and he’s put in his hours, but those are no guarantee of safety. Far from it.
Our baby has a lot more freedom. My wife and I will get a few more gray hairs. That’s how the wheels of life turn… and you can’t slow them down.
No this isn’t a post about math. I’m not really wired that way.
I’m talking about college basketball. Over the past couple days we’ve seen why the NCAA College Basketball Tournament is the best sporting event in the United States. If you disagree, you’re wrong. The Super Bowl is way too much hype. The NBA Finals and the World Series are usually won by the teams with the fattest payroll. And the NHL? Well I don’t know much about hockey, but I imagine their finals are like the world’s worst ice fishing expedition.
Over the past couple days of March Madness® (that’s a trademarked term by the way… good thing I don’t make any money on this blog), lots of games went right down to the wire. Especially on Thursday. There were three overtime games. Two teams that were seeded #12 beat the teams that were seeded #5. Number 16 seed Georgia State went toe to toe with the top-ranked Gonzaga Bulldogs for about 30 minutes…. unfortunately for them, college basketball games are 40 minutes long.
But the cherry on top was when the scrappy Peacocks from Saint Peter’s University beat the blue-blooded Wildcats from the University of Kentucky. Saint Peter’s went into the game a 17.5-point underdog. but they kept fighting and kept scrapping and knocked off one of the most storied programs in college basketball, and a perennial powerhouse. The #15 seed was greater than #2.
In case you didn’t know it, St Peter’s University is in Jersey City, New Jersey. The city where I was born.
389 Liberty Avenue, Jersey City, NJ… a.k.a. “home”
It’s also the city where my dad’s family grew up. My Uncle John (my Dad’s older brother) was a graduate of Saint Peter’s (back when it was known as St. Peter’s College). And he loved basketball.
Uncle John also loved serving others, so he became a Jesuit priest and taught at a high school in the Philippines for most of his adult life. My dad didn’t go to Saint Peter’s but he was just as much of a staunch Catholic as my priestly uncle. (We jokingly referred to him as “Pope Herbert I.”) So during the college b-ball season, and especially when March Madness® rolled around, he loved rooting for the Catholic universities. He would have been happy over the past couple days: Gonzaga, Creighton, Notre Dame, St. Mary’s, Villanova and Saint Peter’s all advanced to the next round.
Uncle John officiated at my Dad’s wedding
Schools that pull off upsets in the NCAA tourney typically get a boost in college applications. Uncle John and “Pope Herb” would surely be thrilled that a small Jesuit university in their home city is getting some extra attention.
By the time the Saint Peter’s-Kentucky game ended it, it was close to midnight on St. Patrick’s Day. My dad passed away on March 18th twelve years ago. But I know he and my Uncle John are really happy that some scrappy kids from Jersey City — kids with the odds stacked against them — kept on fighting and came out on top.
In fact, I’m sure both of them are high-fiving the original St. Peter right now!
Update: St. Peter’s beat Murray State on 3/19 to advance to the Sweet 16, only the 3rd #15 seed to make it that far in the history of the tourney, and the most unlikely one.
This is far and away the most unlikely Sweet 16 entrant in the history of the NCAA tournament.
Joe Lunardi
This article from Yahoo! Sports captures the euphoria.
“Now all you have to say is St. Peter’s University and everybody knows what you’re talking about. Our basketball team put us on the map.”
Brooke Boutchie, a St. Peter’s student and defender on the women’s soccer team.
My niece Julia got married this past Friday, in her hometown of Brooklyn.
It was a lovely wedding ceremony, and a beautiful reception. (Also a rockin’ reception… I danced more at Julia’s shindig than I did at my own wedding… actually I think I danced more than I had in my entire life, cumulatively.)
But the highlight of the trip was catching up with the whole Morris family:
And meeting Julia’s husband, Tommy:
But it isn’t just the union of Julia and Tommy, it’s the union of the two families:
Julia’s from Brooklyn. Tommy’s from Washington. That’s about as bi-coastal as you can get. It’s not like the two families will become instant “besties”… but now they’re inextricably linked.
I know the Morris crew is good people. And after meeting many members of the Thorpe clan, I could tell that they’re good people too.
We tend to think about a wedding as “from this day forward” but the truth is the building blocks started decades ago. And I know this marriage has a super-strong foundation. One that Julia and Tommy will carry with them back to South Carolina, as they build their life together.
Our 2008 Honda CR-V hit a big milestone a couple of days ago:
I bought it used three and a half years ago… when it already had 181,000 miles on it. Some folks would question the wisdom of buying a 10-year-old car with that many miles on it. But this car was a real cream puff…
(true story, this photo was part of an ad campaign I worked on more than 20 years ago)
I did my research, I trusted the seller , and the price was right. (Heck, with the tight used car market these days, I could probably sell it now for more than we paid for it nearly 20K miles ago.)
“Chad” (that’s the car’s name… dubbed by my daughter) recently went in for an oil change and passed his 30-point inspection with flying colors.
Ostensibly ol’ Chad was for our son Peter, who was 17 at the time. In reality, it’s been used by Peter… and by me for kayaking because it has a roof rack… and by my wife when she’s picking up gardening supplies…. and by all of us when we need to haul bulky stuff or take the dogs to the dog park… and when it snows because it’s all-wheel drive…. and by our now-16-year-old son Andrew, who has his driving permit. We’ve certainly put the “utility” in SUV.
The beauty of buying a used car with that many miles on it is you don’t have to sweat the small stuff. It already has a few dents and door dings and paint scratches. It’s been through the wars and lived to tell the tale. So you can beat it up a bit more and not be too precious with it. Because this ain’t the Miss America Pageant. Looks don’t matter – getting from Point A to Point B is the mission.
One week ago, Florida State played Florida in their annual college football rivalry game. With a bowl game on the line for the winner, Florida State mounted a 4th quarter comeback and was trailing by just three points, 24-21, with 49 seconds to go. They needed to try an onside kick. Here’s what happened:
Florida State kicker Parker Grothaus nearly whiffed on the ball. Very Charlie Brown. Because the ball didn’t travel 10 yards (heck, it barely traveled 10 inches), Florida took over and ran out the clock.
If anyone feels Parker Grothaus’ pain — other than the Florida State faithful — it’s me. And I’ve got the trophy to prove it.
Return with me now to those thrilling days of yesteryear… the summer of 1972, to be specific. A bright-eyed, bushy-tailed, 8-year-old Dubbatrubba entered the Punt, Pass & Kick competition in Clarksville, Arkansas.
Because 1972 was the first year for the national Punt, Pass & Kick competition, and because Clarksville was (and is) a podunk town, there were only two contestants in my age bracket. Winner moves on to regionals. Gotta like those odds.
True to its name, the competition involved each contestant taking a turn punting the football, then throwing a pass, then kicking. In that order. The attempts were measured by distance, but also had to be in a straight line. For example, if your pass went 25 yards but landed 3 yards away from the tape, you’d get 22 for that attempt. Punt, Pass & Kick yardage was combined. High score wins. Got it? Good.
I went first in each round. My punt went considerably farther than my opponent’s. Ditto for my pass. All that stood between me and gridiron glory was a simple kick. I put the ball on the tee, lined up several yards back, got a running start… and pulled a Parker Grothaus:
There weren’t many “fans” in attendance, mostly just family members and other contestants in the higher age brackets. But as soon as I whiffed, I could hear nothing but laughter.
The loudest laughs were coming from the older brother of my opponent. He happened to be the placekicker for the local high school’s football team. And clearly his younger brother had learned a thing or two from him (nature AND nurture), as he proceeded to kick his football a country mile. Game over.
The only thing that could’ve possibly made it more humiliating would’ve been if Lucy Van Pelt were holding the football for me.
Some wags like to say that “second place is just another name for ‘first loser.'” In this case, that was completely accurate.
I was the walking, talking, non-kicking embodiment of the Ricky Bobby motto:
I still have my trophy. It’s one of the few mementos I have from my Arkansas childhood. As much as I’d love to tell you that I use it to motivate me to try harder and do better in all aspects of my life, that’d be dishonest.
The truth is I probably keep it around because it helps me realize that with time and perspective, even the biggest humiliations aren’t that big of a deal. And because a good story beats a gold trophy every time.
Besides, my opponent probably went up against some freak of nature behemoth like Andy Reid in the regionals.
impossibly4332b32374 on Light. Laughter. Grace.: “I’ve got The Wet Engine on my shelf, and think I read about half of it. Time for another look.” Apr 21, 09:15
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