John Foley

I’m planning to officiate basketball this winter, and recently completed some training. I refereed years ago in Alaska, sort of winging it, and it was good to finally learn the formalities so I don’t have to say things such as, “Foul on the dude with the pony tail, two shots.”

The dedicated professionals who ran the training camp taught us all the calls, and I couldn’t help but reflect that the world would be a better place if basketball referees controlled the game. Here are a few “players” who should be whistled for violations:

Jon and Kate: Three seconds. Camping out in the public lane. Move along, and take your eight teammates with you. 

Sarah Palin: Exiting the court with time on the clock. A former point guard and current hockey mom should know she can’t leave the game early, don’t ya think?

Bret Favre: Over and back. Once you cross the line into retirement, there’s no coming back, even if the Vikings don’t suck this year.

Kanye West: Technical foul. Entering the game from the bench area without permission. Our make-up call will be a Swift kick to the cojones.

Rush Limbaugh: You’ve taken cheap shots at blacks, women, gays, liberals and little kids on a bus. That’s five and you are outta the game!

David Letterman and his blackmailer: Double foul! Flagrant foul! In flagrante delicto foul! Foul, foul, foul!

President Obama: Charging. The $700 billion you spent to bail out Wall Street and $3.6 trillion you budgeted for the next fiscal year are clearly offensive, and while you’ve made some good moves, Mr. President, we’re going the other way.

Colorado Balloon Guy: Goaltending. Interfering with the downward flight. And the upward flight. And tending goals with your kid. Count the basket and take a flying leap to the Big House.

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie: Travelling. You moved your pivot foot in seven countries in six weeks. Not much of a violation, but we don’t coddle superstars.

“Am I not a man? And is a man not stupid? I’m a man, so I married. Wife, children, house, everything. The full catastrophe.” –Zorba The Greek

I like Jon Kabat-Zinn’s books on mindfulness, the first of which he titled, “Full Catastrophe Living.” A few key points he makes:

1)Mindfulness is not a dime-store relaxation technique; it’s a way of life that needs to be cultivated.

2)Most folks go through life like robots, automatically, responding to their conditioning, living more in the past or the future rather than the present moment.

3)The present moment is all you ever have and should not be missed.

4)Fears, desires, regrets and conditioning all dissolve in present moment awareness.

5)When the mind strays from the moment, you should not beat yourself up, or you’ll be beating yourself up quite often. As Kabat-Zinn says, mindfulness is only the hardest thing in the world.

My mind recently strayed from the present moment. I had enjoyed a kayak paddle around the east end of Hayden Island, working against the current for the first twenty minutes, looking toward the Gorge, then catching a fast ride west when I rounded the tip of the island and caught the Columbia River current. I hauled out at the marina and left my kayak outside the entrance while I went to get my car, about a half-mile west at McCuddy’s. I didn’t like leaving my kayak and was in a hurry, so I just hopped in the car and started driving back. I got about twenty feet when I heard a terrible noise, as if I’d run over a dog. There was no dog. The rope I used I tie off the front end of the kayak when it is on the roof rack had slipped under the tire and, trapped there for a moment, pulled off the front bumper of the car. All because I was thinking about the future – getting back to fetch my boat – rather than the present. Hard not to beat myself up for that one: “Is a man not stupid!” Hard for my wife not to beat me up, too, when she saw the car. Chalk it up to the full catastrophe and a mindless moment.

(The following guest column recently appeared in The Oregonian. I admire cyclists, but I worry about them. I’ve seen more than a few of the kamikaze variety around Portland. I’d ride my bike to work if I could do so safely. It’s 10 miles one way and would be a great workout, save money, help the environment and probably end badly – there are no shoulders on the roads, much less bike paths, so I’d be forcing polite drivers into the oncoming lane. And I don’t want to think about what impolite drivers might do to me.)

I was saddened to hear that Hudson’s Bay High School teacher Gordon Patterson was killed in an accident recently. Patterson was riding his bicycle, which he used to commute, when he was struck and killed by a former student in Vancouver.
 
My heart goes out to Patterson — by all accounts, a fine teacher and person — and his family. But I must admit I don’t understand how anyone would choose to ride a bike on city streets. Millions do, every day, all over the world.

I applaud cyclists and their environmental awareness. I’ve pedaled a bike to work myself in years past when I lived in a small city with bike paths. But riding alongside — or worse yet, within — auto traffic? I think that’s complete madness.

In addition to helping the environment and saving money on fuel, cyclists often cite health as a reason to pedal. Do they not see the irony here? That in trying to improve health they are endangering life?

In 1989, I planned to run with the bulls in Pamplona, Spain. Friends warned me that was crazy. Yet I would’ve done it but for one small detail: I couldn’t get a ride from Barcelona to Pamplona and was too short of funds to take public transportation.

I think I would’ve enjoyed Pamplona and those bulls that Hemingway made famous. They weigh an average of 1,500 pounds and are certainly dangerous, having killed 13 runners between 1926 and the present.

Compare that to some other statistics: About 43,000 people die in auto accidents each year in the U.S., and 2.9 million are injured. The average car weighs 4,000 pounds. I’m not sure what the average bicycle weighs, but it’s a helluva lot less.

Ride your bicycle on a path or don’t ride. For your sake and the sake of your family. It’s not fair, it’s not right — but most of all, it’s not worth your life to ride with the mechanical bulls.

While pushing a cart through the grocery store yesterday, we heard a nice comment about Sean Michael. “What a great looking baby,” a man said. This is actually somewhat common, and biased or not, we can’t help but agree. We thanked the man and he asked how old Sean was. “Nearly 11 months,” Jules said. The man looked at me and said, “Isn’t it great being a grandpa?” This marked the second time I’d been mistaken for Sean Michael’s grandfather by a stranger; I’m 49, so it’s an understandable mistake that doesn’t bother me at all, but Miss Jules started to growl. She’s nearly a decade younger than me and does NOT like the grandma implication. Fortunately, the man headed off to the deli before she could take him out with a jumbo yellow onion.