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Two sports figures stand out from my teenage years: the slugger Reggie Jackson in his pinstriped New York Yankees uniform, No. 44; and the speed skater Eric Heiden in his golden skinsuit. Oh boy, how I wanted to grow up to be like them! I signed up for baseball and played all I could. I bought a Yankees cap to wear with my team’s uniform (never mind that the colors didn’t match). The coach told us that the numbers on our uniforms would run from 1 to 15. I requested the No. 4 — it being the closest to Reggie's No. 44. (In fact, I begged for it.) It was a hot day when the coach arrived at the field with our new uniforms. I got my No. 4, and then when practice was over, walked to the uniform shop with all the money from my piggy bank and had another No. 4 sewn next to the one that was already there. No doubt I looked silly out on the field. I had a crooked number on my back, a hat that didn’t match, and a running style that mimicked Reggie Jackson’s. But I didn’t care. I felt like a million dollars.
Emulating Eric Heiden was more of a challenge, given the fact that I lived on the Mexican side of the mountainous Southwestern Chihuahuan desert. There wasn’t an ice rink anywhere in the contiguous six states — not to mention a 400 meter oval. The closest I ever got to ice skating was in my imagination: I had a secret plan to move to Michigan and live with my distant aunt and uncle. Thank God I never told my mother about it; I would have gotten a good spanking! Before long, I realized that ice skating was a giant divide that I would be unable to cross anytime soon. Reggie vs. Eric For me as a teenager, the difference between Reggie Jackson and Eric Heiden was like the difference between a home-based and absent father. Reggie was very “available.” You could watch him on TV, you could listen to him being interviewed, you could buy a uniform like his, you could see his photos in the newspaper, and you could cut them out and paste them on your wall (if you hadn’t already bought a poster.) Eric Heiden, on the other hand, was so “unavailable” that his absence transformed him into a mysterious and enigmatic figure. To catch a glimpse of him was as difficult as spotting the ever elusive Red Spotted Purple Tongued Singing and Dancing Fluffy Tailed Coyote. I remember vividly the Saturday afternoon when I first saw him. I must have been 13 years old. I was watching ABC’s Wide World of Sports. I remember seeing the starter holding the gun in the air. And then bang! ... they were off. It was something like love at first sight when I saw Eric Heiden speeding down the straightaway. He looked like Spider-Man incarnate. If anyone ever slid off the pages of a Marvel comic-book,, it was Heiden. He seemed like one of the characters from the epic poems my great grandmother used to read to me ... Thor, Achilles or even the Minotaur. Continued ... Page 1| 2 >>> | |||||||||||||||||||||
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