Getting Tossed Under Bus Popular Lately

It seems there has been an inordinate amount of disloyalty lately. Especially in the political realm. I’ll pause here to inform you that I won’t be publicly taking sides in the upcoming presidential election. I intend to have some fun in this column as I endure the process, but an endorsement is not forthcoming. Make your own educated choice. Who cares which candidate a Hollywood star supports or what a coach who poses as a columnist thinks?

Back to the disloyalty thing. It seems that in this particular election a catch-phrase has emerged. It isn’t new but it is destined to remain as a vocabularial (not a word but you know I like to invent) fixture for generations to come. The phrase involves the fractured relationship between two previously connected individuals caused by a sudden desire on the part of one of the parties involved to disassociate with or place blame upon the other.

News commentators and political analysts call it “throwing someone under the bus.” Ouch. During my coaching career I have ridden many a bus for umpteen million miles and I can tell you, the area under a bus is one of my least desirable places to visit, especially if said bus is in motion.

There are other ways to describe it. Hanging someone out to dry. Flushing someone down the toilet. Backstabbing, dishing, cutting ties. That sorta thing. Either way, it’s no fun to be the recipient of such an action.

Not to say politicians are wrong for doing it. The TV political analysts keep claiming it’s necessary. Take, for example, the three remaining candidates for President of the United States.

Each has been forced for different reasons to toss former friends under the bus to save their own reputations. Senator Clinton axed her campaign manager after a string of losses a while back. She claimed they remain good friends but I gotta wonder how much they’ve been calling and texting each other since axe day.

Senator McCain heaved some of his staffers onto the street in the path of an oncoming Greyhound when he discovered that they were found to be consorting with lobbyists, which Mr. McCain claims to be uninfluenced by.

And a day after Senator Obama’s former pastor called a press conference to explain his views, the senator conducted his own press conference. You guessed it- under the bus went the pastor.

Personally, I think people have already grown tired of hearing about folks being tossed under buses. And I suppose buses are offended as well- assuming rightfully that the whole deal is bad for their image. Of course, if we say “cut ties,” then neckties are offended. If we say “hanging out to dry,” clotheslines and nooses will take offense. And if we insist on flushing or canning folks, toilets will raise a stink.

So I guess we’re stuck with the figurative hurling of human beings into the paths of imaginary oncoming buses. I’m not a big fan of the analogy, but every channel I flip to on my television has some “expert” who is enamored with the phrase. Perhaps when the election is done the experts will no longer be needed and the networks will give them the opportunity to discover what it feels like to get thrown under the bus.

Grammatical Parralelism Baffles Me

I’ve never been much of a committee kinda guy. I fidget a lot during meetings. My mind constantly strays when I’m sitting in a room full of people discussing important stuff. I worry I will burp or do something gross involuntarily. I don’t bring a drink to meetings because I have that reflux thing that causes me to cough and gag sometimes if a liquid goes down wrong. Embarrassing to say the least.

I’m paranoid that my chair will make a rude sound when I shift in my seat. And I catch myself watching people so closely sometimes that I can’t hear what they’re saying. I’m not proud of any of this phenomenon. But the fact of its existence remains.

But perhaps the greatest issue that confronts me when I am serving on a committee of intelligent and learned people is my ineptitude at comprehending big words. I am often exposed to more highly educated people than me who are able to spout structurally eloquent sentences using intelligent sounding words that flow freely and naturally.

My simpleton mind sticks on the words I hear whose definitions evade me. By the time the thought is complete, I’ve missed the entire point thanks to my obsession with the terms I couldn’t comprehend due to my scholarly inefficiency.

Trying my hardest to appear semi-intelligent during these particular discussions is taxing but I’ve become reasonably proficient at disguising my weaknesses. But recently my ineptitude reared its ugly head during a meeting of the minds.

The issue at hand was the specific wording of an important document destined for public consumption. One member suggested something about the structure of a particularly tricky sentence needing to be concisely informative while conveying proper grammatical parallelism. When a fellow committee member glanced my direction and suggested that perhaps “the writer” could help out, I wet my pants. (Figuratively, not literally, thankfully.)

Having little idea what grammatical parallelism actually meant, I did what I always do in these situations. In this order, I: 1)panicked, 2)wet my pants (again figuratively), 3)reverted to my sense of humor and quick wittedness to relieve the tension. Said I, “Any of you who’ve read my columns know I butcher the English language and proper grammar on a regular basis. So you might want to move on to Option Number Two.”

With the tension adequately relieved, a light-hearted discussion of proper grammar ensued. At one point, a member even joked about the grammatical parallelism of a sentence that went something like “This is a situation with which up I will no longer put.”

Off the hook, I joined in the laughter and wiped the sweat from my hands onto my pants when no one was watching.

Flash forward to a meeting two weeks later. At one point I offered my perspective on a particular issue. My words were typically elementary and afterwards, I was concerned that I had merely lengthened the duration of the discussion with my soliloquy. But after the meeting, a colleague for whom I have great admiration pulled me aside and informed me that my words were humbling and inspirational. Suddenly I felt profoundly cerebral, even though I’m pretty sure none of the phrases I uttered during the meeting involved anything remotely parallel in the grammatical sense.

Messenger of Peace Finally Home After Controversial Tour

This picture will make sense once you've finished reading this column.

He’s finally home. After visiting five continents and nineteen countries in the past few months, he deserves some time off. His tour was designed to promote peace, unity, goodwill among mankind and all that sort of thing.

But it didn’t go all that smoothly even though he’s a veteran world traveler, embarking on his first tour in 1936. Back then people were irritated at him because they thought Hitler was using him as a diabolical propaganda tool to promote Nazi Germany. He always seems to get caught up in the middle of messes he has nothing to do with.

He has a team of security guards who are willing to sacrifice their lives to protect him. On his most recent tour, his personal security team was aided by 3000 French police to guarantee his personal security while he visited Paris. London officials spent more than a million pounds to protect him while he was herded through England.

Despite the security, the European tour was adventurous and dangerous. Protestors lined the streets of Paris and a number of them climbed buildings and bridges to unfurl banners of protest due to his presence.

His safety was so threatened in that country that on three separate occasions he was whisked out of the streets and quickly herded onto public buses to protect him from the angry crowds.

In London, he was attacked by a protestor armed with- off all things- a fire extinguisher. Ouch! Fortunately his security guards intervened and the attacker went straight to jail. Similar to his trip to France, his security situation became so fractious at one point that his security team hid him in a single-decker bus for nearly an hour until the situation improved.

Forced to confront continuing safety factors, his security team met to determine whether or not he should continue his international tour. As far as I know, he was given no say in the matter. And to date, his opinions concerning the controversy that surrounds him have yet to appear in the print or news media.

When he arrived in San Francisco, public officials there chose to play a game of hide and seek to guarantee his safety. Using decoys and misinformation, his security team whisked him in and out of venues all over the city, leaving many who merely wanted to catch a glimpse of him disappointed and frustrated.

The only incident of significance occurred when a protestor with a sense of humor attempted to shoot him with a squirt gun. And he was shuffled into a warehouse at one point, miraculously appearing a few minutes later several miles away.

He’s maintained his silence but I think if given the opportunity he would say something like- “It’s healthy for people to protest and express their beliefs, but I don’t have anything to do with that. I’m just here to spread peace and harmony among mankind.”

Poor thing. Trying to spread peace and goodwill- while around him- protestors protest and politicians debate. He is not the Pope. He is not president of any country and he’s not running for any office though I think he would have liked John Kennedy’s speech about the torch being passed to a new generation. He is the Olympic torch and I wish people would leave him the heck alone.

Now go back and look at the picture at the top of this page. That's the Olympic Torch sticking up in the middle and they are guarding it like it's the President.

Crosses in the Dirt

Believe it or not, coaches who compete against each other can be friends. A handful of commentators, fans, and reporters don’t like that. Takes the edge off the game, they say. Shows weakness, say others. Makes you hesitant to drive the nail in the coffin when you get the chance, claim fanatics.

My job is to coach a college baseball team. I compete against other coaches three or four days a week during the spring season. Only when provoked do I develop any sort of dislike for an opposing coach. It has happened during my career, but it is the exception rather than the rule.

I don’t think people on the outside looking in realize how much respect we coaches have for each other. We face the same daily challenges and frustrations. We struggle to maintain a proper balance between our coaching responsibilities and our family lives. We sometimes question how much difference we’re making in our players’ lives.

I stood and talked to one of my competitors during a long rain delay recently. He’s a great guy and a Christian brother who is going through a nasty divorce. He asked me to pray for him and I assured him I would. When play resumed, we tried to kill each other- within the rules, of course.

I wear the number 7 on my jersey. I have since I was a kid. Some say it is a Biblical number. I like that but I must admit the Scriptural significance was lost on me as a child when my attachment to the number 7 began.

During every baseball game I coach, I scratch a cross in the dirt near the third base coaching box to remind myself to keep things in perspective. I’m not trying to draw attention but I’ve had umpires, opposing third basemen, and rival coaches ask me about my crosses.

Some call it superstition, one umpire called it voodoo, and some opponents wipe it out each inning. I replace it every inning anyway but I guess they think I might be getting an edge. My favorite memory occurred a few years back when a fellow coach scratched two smaller crosses on each side of mine, an obvious reference to Calvary.

One particular coaching friend of mine has noticed my crosses for years. But only recently did I learn something about him. I know he is a Christian based on our past conversations, but I never knew why he wore number 77 on his back before this season.

His reasoning is truly inspirational. He wears 77 to remind his players that no matter what they do, he will forgive them as Jesus taught him to forgive. Not just seven times, but seventy times seven. “The one thing they’ll always know is that I love them unconditionally,” he says.

This coach is not soft on misconduct. He consistently punishes his players for discipline violations, even removing two of his players from the team this year. Their program has some disadvantages yet they are highly competitive in their conference. My friend is not only an effective coach, he is making a difference in people’s lives.

And guess what? Even though we coach our buns off against each other, we still respect and admire one another. Confusing to some, refreshing to others. It’s all a matter of perspective.