Stanchley

[The following is a true story, but I have changed the names.]

I used to work for the Forestry Department of my hometown during the summers of my college years.

The term "Forestry" sounds grand and Romantic.  It conjures images of swarthy men inspecting the scat of moose along game trails to determine the health of an animal population.

But in Elmhurst, there are no forests.  There are only suburban parkways, public green spaces, a median strip on York Road, trees in front of houses that needed care.

And there was Rick Stanchley, among others.  Rick was either stoned all the time, or wont to speak as though he were stoned all the time.  He drank coffee from a beat-up plastic travel mug--at least a quart of coffee each morning.  He smoked cigarettes.  So many, in fact, that his side lip seemed to have a permanent indent where the cig sat all day long.

Rick hated loud noises.  He'd reach in and turn the key of your truck engine if he needed to talk to you at your window.  Turn this damn thing off! 

He'd scowl when the part-timers returned at the end of the day and--rowdy kids!--shuffled in, joking, laughing, on our way to the tool shed to hang the shovels up--Would you all just shut up?!  Man, I mean why do you have to be so loud?

[That's what first captured my imagination about him: how he said, Man.  He made it sound like about 5 cuss words wrapped up in one modest syllable.]

We part-timers figured this distaste for noise was related to his experience in the Vietnam War--he always wore his Vet ball cap--but I got to know him one summer and learned that he had served at a supply base and had not seen combat.

"Was it ever terrifyingly loud on your base?" I asked him, trying to get to the bottom of it.

He looked at me with his beautiful--no, gorgeous eyes--they were pale baby blue, the color people wear fake contacts for--but eyes that were inside a face of leather, creased through, with gray whiskers and long, straggly gray hair.  A full 15 years beyond his age, in fact, when I finally learned he was only 42. 

He looked at me with those impossible eyes and said, "What are you talking about?  It's terrifyingly loud almost everywhere almost all the time."

The other thing Rick hated was traffic. 

He was living and working in Elmhurst!  What did he ever see of traffic?

But he'd be grinding out a stump (with the stumper--the loudest machine in the Department) and he'd stop after only a second or third car had gone by to say, "Would you look at the traffic?"

One day, circumstances collided in Rick's world. 

He was driving the big ole cherry picker truck, and was waiting in the middle of the intersection at West and St. Charles, ready to turn left through the green light.

The on-coming line of cars on West never let up for him to make that turn.

"Would you look at this?" he said to Jeff, his partner that day who sat in the passenger's seat.  Or maybe Rick was just remarking.  "Would you look at this traffic?"

The on-coming cars didn't stop.  West Avenue!  It was not even a through-street!  Why so many cars?

"This is unbelievable," Rick said.  "I mean, I don't even believe this."  Jeff didn't say anything.

The light turned yellow.  Rick sat up, ready to turn.  But the cars kept coming.

"What?. . .What is with this traffic?"  Confusion turned to anger.

Then the light turned red.  The cars kept coming.

Anger turned to fury.

Rick rolled down the window of the cheery picker, he shook his hand out, giving each driver the finger.  He pulled the string of the air horn at them, scourging them with blasts that covered over all his own cussing.  Oh, that traffic.

Then it stopped.  The intersection cleared.  He turned left onto St. Charles.

Moments later, he rolled his window back up.

Moments after that, he said to Jeff, silent and stalwart, "Could you believe that traffic?"

Jeff nodded and said, "Yeah, Rick.  That was a funeral."

The Fighter Still Remains

I would not have guessed this, but boxers taper as swimmers do.  In his last week before the tournament, Roberts went for a short run in the morning, and then met a coach for a workout in the evening.  By Thursday, though, he had shut the energy valves all together.

Before his arrival, I'd had the impression that this elite athlete would be among us, training for hours on end and consuming mass quantities of food.  Instead, there was an elite athlete among us who read a lot, napped each afternoon, and chatted about his family, my family and, as his week of weight-watching progressed, all the food he would eat back in Chicago after the tournament.  Portillos.  Nina's steak house.  Giordano's stuffed pizza.  Poor guy.

And we talked more about boxing:

Does he know most of the guys he'll be competing against in this tournament?

Yeah, most of them.  And they know him.


Does the posturing start right there in the hotel lobby while they're all registering for the event?  You know, like the swagger and the stink eye and staring guys down?

No.  They usually shake hands (he mimes the hand-grip-pull-in-for-a-man-brother-hug) and say 'How you doin'?' and stuff.  And then in the ring, they just fight. 


Are there any competitors he just can't stand?

No, he likes them all well enough.  Sometimes they'll want to be friends on Facebook.  Robert says, "They try to 'friend' me, and I'm like, 'The extend of our relationship is that we punch each other,' but they're all good enough guys."


Does he feel acclimated?

Yes, he can tell a big difference from his first run here.  Not all the competitors will have had the opportunity to acclimate, so his strategy will be to hit the gas right away and get the other guy winded. 

(The fights are 3 rounds of 3 minutes each, which doesn't seem long to me.  But in the ring, I'll bet "early" feels "early" and the "later" feels a lot later.) 


I asked him if he was well known, if he was a guy to watch out for.

He's modest.  Not enamored with himself.  But a record is a record, and his is pretty notable.  Yeah, guys know who he is, and that he's "heavy-handed."

Huh?

"They tell me that.  I'm real heavy-handed, like my punch just goes right through them.  Some guys are heavy-handed like that--just the physiology and the bone structure" (and the technique, I'm thinking) "makes the punch just plow hard.  Some guys they call 'feather-fisted,' because the punches just don't land hard."

How could someone feather-fisted even compete?  A point is a point, I guess, regardless of how much the opponent feels it.

Hey.  "Heavy-handed," I'm going to add that to the List on our List page.  Check it out.  The tab is at the top.



Roberts liked our dog, Benziger.  He's small.  (The dog, not Roberts, who is 6'3.)  But he's confident.  (The dog, not. . .oh, well, yes, both of them.) 

Benziger barked at Roberts when we first came in the door from the airport.  One bark.  Pause.  Another bark.  Pause.  Another.  And so on for a couple minutes.

The dog followed our guest down to his room in the bathroom and instead of following me back up as Benziger always does, he stayed there watching Roberts.  Kept poking his head around the corner to see him, Roberts reported, and then darting back whenever Roberts turned to look. 

Good dog.  Keep an eye on that guy. 

The kids liked Roberts, too.  There wasn't any wrestling or horsing around--I do believe Josh could injure someone--but there was something about him that the kids appreciated.  Gemma made him an elaborate birthday card.  Josh burst into tears when told that Roberts would be leaving the next day. 

And Bryan liked having him visit as well.  Didn't get to talk with him as much, but enjoyed his company when he could. 

We had a bit of time to use before he was to leave with Bryan to check in at his hotel and tournament. And we used it to watch an episode of Seinfeld, of which Roberts is also a huge fan. 

(It was the one where Kramer gets a rooster and names it 'Little Jerry' and ends up training it for a cock fight.  Roberts and I were laughing the whole time.  Bryan came in at the end, saw Jerry holding up mits for the rooster to peck at during its training session and said, "Cocks fight with their feet.  This is ridiculous," and that is why Bryan a) hates the show and b) ruins it for the rest of us but also c) demonstrates his devotion to me in that he is the one who bought me the deluxe box set of the series when it was half off at Best Buy.)

It was time for him to go, and we prayed for him.  Roberts is a Christian.  These were prayers he appreciated. 

I am writing this post on Saturday, but it will not go up until Tuesday, by which time, Roberts will have already fought at least once.  I intend to keep you posted on his results.


But in the meantime, let me tell you the highlight of my week with this person: 

He decided he wants to try acting.  He's got plans for boxing, hopes for going professional, other  hopes for expanding his business as a personal trainer.  But he wants to try acting.

He took a class at Second City and decided he liked it.  He was able to get some nice head shots.  He's ready to start seeking agent representation.

And all this was my highlight because it was just so inspiring.  Why not?  You like acting?  You've always wanted to try acting?  Then why wouldn't you go ahead and try acting?

I had been thinking for months now that I really wanted to blog again. 
"But this." 
"But that." 
"But. . . "

And then: Why not?

A Fighter by His Trade

There's something Romantic about boxers. 

Not boxing, per se.  But the actual boxers.

The heads slamming back, spit flying out, knees buckling under, wet bodies landing on the mat like small trees felled--that's all. . .too much. . .hurt for my tastes.

But the picture of two men stepping into the ring to do all that slammin' and spittin' and bucklin' and fallin'--it's grand.  It's a Big Idea embodied.  The definition of Romanticism. 

Everyone else recognizes this Romanticism, too, if we judge by the ubiquitous  nature of boxing language and metaphor.  There's that Teddy Roosevelt quote about victory belonging to "the man in the ring."

The phrases, "Throw my hat into the ring," and "take the gloves off," and "below the belt." 

And the Simon & Garfunkle song.  (It's going to be in my head all day now.  Maybe yours, too.)

[Care to add any references?  There is a tab on top of this page titled "Lists," and we can use that page to compile a list of boxing references.  Just leave your ideas in the comment box.  I'll bet we can get to 25.]

Then, one day, I picked up a boxer at the Colorado Springs airport.  Roberts Jacobsons, and that first "s" is not a typo, his family is from Latvia and that's how they do boy names.

No need to panic, Bryan and I are still very happily married.

Roberts is a family friend from Chicago, and he is competing in the US National Amateur tournament this week.  The winner of his weight class will have the opportunity to qualify for the Olympic team.  He stayed with us all of last week to acclimate to the altitude.  Great guy.  Very polite guest.  Very nice young man. 

Very patient with my long list of Questions Any Normal Person Would Want to Ask a Boxer.


"Does it hurt when you get hit?"

No.  Well. Maybe if the guy lands a good body shot.  But not in the head.  It might tingle a little, but it doesn't hurt.


"Does it help if you can get angry right before the fight?"

No.  Anger works against you.  It helps to get psyched up with a lot of energy, but not with anger.


"Are you scared right before a fight?  Especially if the other guy is really big?"

No.  The only time I was scared was right before my very first fight.  And I'm in a weight class with a max 200 lbs, and I'm 200 lbs even, so there's no one bigger than me anyway. 


About the weight:  Roberts had to be careful all week.  You don't come all this way just to be disqualified for being a pound over.  Before his arrival, I thought for weeks about the meals I would plan and the day before, I bought plenty of healthful groceries.

Then the guy got here and was dieting like a girl. . .


He was also battling chronic "sinusitis"--kind of like a sinus infection, in terms of symptoms anyway.  moving to super-dry air isn't going to help that a whole lot.

He was using homeopathic nose sprays (no medicine at all, the doping list is long and convoluted and he didn't want to take the chance); inhaling steam from boiling water, putting hot Korean red pepper sauce on his food (the only spicy stuff we had).  By the end of the week, he reported that his nasal passages were feeling a lot better.

"What do you think helped the most?"

Honestly, not being punched in the nose all week. 

Other questions:

"Do you watch old video of famous fights?  Like the 'Thrilla in Manilla'?" 

Yeah, sometimes.  This lead him to comment on Ali, how he should have stopped his career after that particular fight.  Both those guys were in the hospital for 2 months after that fight.  15 rounds in the Philippine humidity.  Their gloves--at first just 10 oz--now full of Vaseline and sweat had to have been over 2 lbs each.  They were killing each other. 

"Wait.  Vaseline?"

Yeah, the cut man keeps them patched together with grease and Vaseline.

"Do you have a cut man?"

We don't need them in Amateurs.  We use head gear, so you don't really get cut, and if there's any blood, the ref stops the fight. 

"So you don't really carry the reminder of every glove that laid you down and cut you 'till you cried out in your anger and your shame that you were leaving, you were leaving, but the fighter still remained?"

I'm kidding.  I didn't ask him that.

But now you definitely have that song in your head.



(Part II to follow)