Sports. Illustrated.
Two words that changed my life.
Not because the magazine sparked my interest in sports, not because it made for excellent bathroom reading material, and not because the Swimsuit Issue mingled body paint with 3-D goggles.
No, Sports Illustrated changed my life because the back inside page ran a column by Rick Reilly.
Whenever SI popped up in my mailbox, I always flipped it over to that last page and read the “Life of Reilly,” spellbound, before ever looking at the cover. Outside of schoolwork, I read books as often as I wore women’s clothing (usually once a year during Spirit Week), but I devoured all of Reilly’s books. “Did you read what Rick Reilly wrote?” I always asked my dad.
About the same time, I read an SI article by some Tim Crothers guy about Matt Doherty’s first win against Duke as UNC’s head coach (keep that in mind).
Professional baseball scouts stopped calling after Tee-ball, so instead I dreamed of becoming the next Rick Reilly. From high school to now, I have been “Newspaper Boy,” distant relative of Quailman. I spent three years writing for the Eastern Voyager and joined The Daily Tar Heel sports desk my first semester at North Carolina.
This year, the DTH gave me a weekly sports column – just like Rick Reilly (except he has more money, and I more hair). It has been one helluva semester writing the Wednesday’s Special for you.
In addition to my column, I took a sportswriting class this spring. Early in the course, my professor handed one of his own stories to the class – a Sports Illustrated article about Matt Doherty’s Tar Heels driving back to Chapel Hill after beating Duke at Cameron. This time around, that Tim Crothers guy who wrote it sat before me in Carroll Hall, taking us behind the scenes.
“They call this school?” I thought. “I guess those out-of-state tuition hikes are worth it.”
The class brought out my personal best work; interviewing Dewey Burke one-on-one for my final was as pleasurable as a Bojangles’ chicken biscuit (though I’ll never eat the recording). And because my column ran on class days, I picked Crothers’ brain on every bite of Green Eggs and Sam.
Weekly advice from a Sports Illustrated veteran? I kept imagining it was all a dream, that I would wake up one day to find my hand in a bowl of warm water and my roommates taking Polaroids. If you told me five years ago that I would be here today, I would have given your foolish keister a wedgie.
But here I am, the semester in the books, my columns on the pages. I’ve never learned so much about myself or my writing before. One of my favorite books – W. Somerset Maugham’s “The Razor’s Edge” – raises the idea that we never know how truly happy we are during certain parts of our lives until we reminisce later on. That said, I know that I will look back on this year someday as one of the happiest of my lifetime.
For that, I offer my sincerest gratitude to my readers – many people who I know, many who I don’t, all who I appreciate. I find it easy to express my feelings in writing, but I never know the right words when I’m eating chicken tenders at Joe’s Joint and you tell me how you and a friend sit down every week to read my column.
Once, my friend Bonnie stopped me on the street while walking with her boyfriend and whispered in my ear, “He loves your columns. He always asks me, ‘Did you read what Sam Rosenthal wrote today?'”
I still call my dad almost weekly asking if he’s read Rick Reilly’s latest piece, so that made my day (slash lifetime). “I think I’m gonna blush,” was the best I could stammer.
This column is my “Thank you” note to anyone who has ever given me feedback, good or bad.
Whether or not I go on to become the next Rick Reilly, Steve Rushin or Tim Crothers, I will always cherish this year. I call it Wednesday’s Special because seeing my column in print every week made the day just that for me.
I’ve waited all year to write it:
I hope you liked Green Eggs and Sam.
Contact Sam Rosenthal at samrose24@gmail.com.
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