By BOB BRIDGE
There’s no feeling quite like rediscovering an old treasure. It’s such an unexpected treat.
I had quit searching long ago for a plaque that hung in the bedroom of my childhood home. Apparently, it was lost in the shuffle when my sister moved everything out of the house after my mother’s death.
The plaque read: “For when the one Great Scorer comes to write against your name, He writes not that you won or lost but how you played the game.“
Grantland Rice, among my favorite sportswriters, obviously penned that classic sentiment during a moment of profundity. It serves as a constant reminder there is a life beyond the realm of sports, and good sportsmanship is a quality we all should aspire to embrace.
I had been searching for another item and discovered it behind a large book in an old box that was collecting dust in a corner of my kitchen. It had been with me all along. Talk about serendipity!
I don’t know its exact origin but I think it was a gift from my maternal grandfather. He took me to baseball games in Evansville’s Bosse Field during the late 1950’s.
The same evening I was reunited with the plaque, I wandered across a paperback that was placed on a patio chair on my carport. I’m pretty sure it was a gift from a neighbor and loyal reader of my columns.
Ironically, I had just finished the last of my library books. The timing could not have been better.
“The Tender Bar,” by J.R. Moehringer, is the best novel I’ve read in a long, long time. It’s based on the author’s boyhood and coming to grips with a deadbeat dad.
Moehringer, a master of the metaphor, finds male companionship via an unusual uncle and his many friends at a local tavern. His love for books leads him to Yale and eventually the New York Times.
The novel is both poignant and humorous. Moehringer’s characterization of his eclectic role models and their extraordinary watering hole are delightfully descriptive and make you feel part of his extended family.
Finding a lost treasure and a new one in the same day. Wow, I should have bought a lottery ticket.
If you can carve out a few hours from your daily regimen, I strongly advise spending them reading the wise words of Rice and Moehringer. I’m sure you’ll be sated by their fun and fundamental food for thought.
Contact Columnist Bob Bridge at 812-276–9646 or bbbbbridge@gmail.com.
That’s a good one Bob.
I used to have that poem by AE Houseman “ To an athlete dying young”
” The time you won your town the race; They chaired you through the marketplace “
Excellent reflections on an athletic life.
If a person is lucky enough to be obsessed with the athletic life.