It's like naked skinny-dipping
SUMMARY: Redundancy is, well, redundant and Mike Dewey goes to great lengths to prove his point in this, a tribute to friendship, disagreement and understanding.Most guys, when they go to parties, end up talking with their friends about pretty predictable stuff.
Why the Browns stink or the way Ohio State's season ended up in the toilet.
Sports is a safe avenue to pursue, usually, unless there's someone like me in the room.
Allow me to explain.
The last time I was home, I was invited to hang out with a group of guys, some of whom I've know since grade school, most since high school.
It was great to be welcomed back after 10 years in the South and I appreciated being back in their midst.
A ton of cliches come to mind: it's like I'd never left or home is where the heart is or that Bon Jovi line, something like, "You take the boy from his home, but not the home from the boy."
And the raw truth of it is that I'll never make friends like that again. They're part of my DNA -- Dewey's Nostalgic Aggregate -- and they matter more, probably, than they'll ever know.
They ALSO know, however, that I can be an opinionated, stubborn intractable jerk, especially when I know I'm right.
Which makes them wrong.
It's a ceaseless pattern we've adhered to for years and I, at least, take great comfort in the fact that I will always be considered a contrarian, even when I'm dead wrong,
Once, many years ago, I asked a seemingly innocent trivia question, not realizing that the answer I had in mind was incorrect.
You have to understand that at gatherings like that, it's what guys do:
Who threw the pitch that Roger Maris hit for his 61st home run?
Where did Walter Payton go to college?
What number did Joe Montana wear with the 49ers?
Who was Larry Bird's coach at Indiana State?
Who was on deck when Bobby Thomson hit "The Shot Heard 'Round the World?"
Easy stuff like that.
Trivia 101.
And that's the sort of safe harbor I thought I was heading into when I asked them, "Who was the last Big Ten player to lead the NBA in scoring?"
Long story short: I thought Dave Bing went to Michigan.
He didn't.
He went to Syracuse.
I stuck with my answer -- since I was sure of it -- for hours.
Man, was I embarrassed.
But that's the thing.
When you're wrong, you're wrong.
You own it forever.
And the guys haven't ever let me forget it.
Years later, I'd walk into a tavern or a bank or a church hall and hear, "Bing!"
It makes you humble and more than a little eager for revenge.
So when I was home last summer, surrounded by my friends again, I mostly just listened as they spoke of things I didn't know: Who was seeing who, the latest business to fail, the most recent sporting accomplishment.
"He set a new record for touchdown passes," one guy said.
And all of sudden, I felt my old self -- the confident, intelligent, articulate person I'd been -- rise from the dead.
"Man," I said, pointing my index finger like a squirt gun loaded with sulfuric acid, "there's no such thing as a 'new' record, unless your talking about music."
Immediately, I had to defend my position.
"They say it all the time on TV."
"They write it in the paper."
"I hear it on the radio."
I just shook my head.
"Then they're all wrong," I said. "Trust me. I'm an English major."
There was considerable grumbling and mumbling and consternation, but they remembered one salient fact: That years before, when they were planning a golf outing and wanted to invite the public to sign up, I'd told them there was no such thing as a "First Annual" tournament.
"Impossible," I said. "Rewrite the ad. In order to be an annual event, it has to have happened at least once."
My logic was unassailable and, of course, I had the Grammar Police on my side.
They changed the flier.
The next year, they advertised it as the Second Annual tournament.
That gave me some standing, some traction, but I was happy to help.
Years later, though, I still had to defend my position on "new record."
I was on familiar ground.
"I don't care that you hear it all the time," I said, squaring my shoulders. "Like my Mom used to say, 'If Johnny jumped off a cliff, would you?' Listen, I know this stuff."
There was calm for a minute and then someone asked the most important question, the one I'd been anticipating.
"Well," he said, "why?"
I smiled.
"Because it's redundant," I said. "Say that you bowled a hundred straight perfect games. You with me?"
He hesitated for a second or two.
"OK," he finally said, doubt creeping into his tone.
"Well," I said, closing in, "it's obviously a record. Never been done before. And you possess it."
He seemed unconvinced.
"Of course it's new," I said. "You just did it Get it? It's the record. By definition, it's new."
I needed something more, another way to bring it back home.
"It's like saying 'naked skinny-dipping,' " I said.
My point was made.
And, at that juncture, the conversation sailed into more comfortable waters.
"Remember that girl?" another guy asked. "The one who'd just ...."
And we were off and running, friends once more.
Mike Dewey can be emailed at Carolinamiked@aol.com or snail-mailed at 6211 Cardinal Drive, New Bern, NC 28560.