It’s not all fun and games taking a prolonged baseball vacation in sunny Florida. First of all, you have to come home — to reality.
There was the bag of unpaid bills that were blissfully ignored for the winter. Those credit card companies are relentless. Then there is the bigger bag of unread magazines. I forget how many I subscribe to, until I see them all together, waiting.
It will take me months to catch up with the relentlessly weekly New Yorker, because every time you finish an issue (political commentary, cartoons, movie reviews, etc.), another one comes in the mail. The pile in my bed now constitutes a fire hazard.
I must be judicious. I will skip the endless article on the new French cooking school but must read the book-length “Did a fight to save the elephants go too far?” I will skip “Are you cool enough to shop in Brooklyn” but devour the profile on Clint Eastwood. I will skip the expose on fashion democracy and another on combating wrinkles.
I know that “Obama’s Lost Year” by George Packer will take an entire afternoon, but I must, I must. John McPhee takes on lacrosse in the March 22 edition. That will go toward the top of the pile. I will skip all reports on gay marriage (“Don’t ask, who cares?”) but devour the movie reviews.
I will be reading February issues of the New Yorker well into June.
My favorite magazine is Sports Illustrated and you can’t just shuck them aside because they date back to the Winter Olympics. Right in the middle of the March 8 edition, which brought the “news” that Canada had finally won the gold medal in its national game of hockey, was a report on Joe Gaetjens. I know you have never heard of Joe Gaetjens.
But you should have. Gaetjens scored the winning goal when the U.S. beat England 1-0 in the 1950 World Cup held in Brazil, a stunning upset in its day. Today, he would be on the cover of SI, lead ESPN broadcasts for a month and make tens of millions in endorsements from sneaker companies. Instead, Gaetjens returned to his native Haiti and became just another statistic in the brutal rule of “Papa Doc” Duvalier and his dreaded Tonton Macoutes, the secret police.
On July 7, 1964, they came for the soccer star because relatives were involved in anti-government activities, they said. Gaetjens was never seen by his family again.
You just have to wade through the SI March Madness coverage just to see who was right, then plunge into the baseball predictions. Like many prognosticators, SI picks the beloved Red Sox for THIRD, behind the Yankees, naturally, but also the Tampa Rays. We shall see.
The pile of Vanity Fair mags has matchless beauty Grace Kelly on the cover, so that will be read since it carries the latest salacious details of Tiger’s off-course (pun intended) activities. The March issue has a report on the making of “Raging Bull” so that will go on the “must-read pile” on the bed which is now falling on the floor.
Men’s Journal can be leafed through most of the time. But this coach potato will linger long enough to read “Climbing Borneo’s Forbidden Chasm” and “Frostbite Safari, Stalking Polar Bears in the Arctic Circle.” Plus they have all this great gear that I will never use, but have to have — just in case. Like the $6,499 Cannondale bicycle (with real disc brakes). Maybe not.
Because I have too much time on my hands, I also subscribed to Texas Monthly, with articles like “Bucket List, 63 things all Texans should do before they die.” One is to buy a pair of custom-made cowboy boots, calfskin to crocodile. I don’t know about you, but that is not on my bucket list. But I will read about the firing of Texas Tech football coach Mike Leach, just for laughs.
I get Esquire only because it is so cheap, but I will peruse the sexy (honest!) pictures of Tina Fey.
Then, I will go to the post office for this week’s slug of new magazines.
It’s a good thing I don’t have a job.
Send complaints and compliments to Emmet Meara at emmetmeara@msn.com.