Winter has come to the party like a couple of guys who are an hour or two late. You can instantly tell that they've started well before the party began and that they're headed for the toilet sometime in the future. But before all the really bad stuff happens, you begin to think that they could be a lot of fun if you look at them the right way...
So what happened, you ask? Well, snow came this weekend and it came in a storm. Silistra woke up to a completely white world Sunday morning. Some drifts were 3 1/2, 4 feet high. A couple of cars are completely buried. Needless to say, I spent all of Sunday in the apartment, reading, watching TV, and loving the idea of being warm.
This morning I was pretty sure there weren't going to be classes, but I left for work and walked along the barely cleared streets anyway. Silistra doesn't seem to have an actual snow clearance program. Instead of plowing, slating, and maybe plowing again, Silistra plows the main streets and leaves the smaller ones to be driven down. This works great in that it will leave the town nice and white for a week, at least. It also means that schools around here have declared snow days for today, tomorrow, and (rumor has it) Wednesday.
This means that I get to go to school and write grades in the registers in peace, without students trying to argue themselves up a grade. It will make this week so, so, so much easier, even if school still happens on Wednesday. I can't stress how much the idea of not having school for part of this week, of all weeks, pleases me.
So I have a bit of freedom. And that freedom has left me time to do a very important thing, read the copy of Phil Jackson's The Last Season that I miraculously received from Grandma back in the states. Of all the things I get introspective about, the Lakers are pretty close to the top of the list, the key question I always ask being "Why do I care so much?" Jackson certainly didn't answer that question in the book, but he did write a great narrative about a season that caused a lot of Laker fans to take stock of their fan-ness.
Two themes really stood out in the book, one about the Game, the other about Laker management. Jackson's theory that the way the game should be played and the way players play are far apart is pretty obvious, but something everyone has been trying to get around for a long time. Collections of severe individuals make for bad teams, basically.
The other thing I had no idea about, but it served as a great little narrative device. Jackson treats GM Mitch Kupchak and owner Jerry Buss, in his own Jackson way, like two good friends who are really, under it all, the bad guys. The kind of people you'd find in some Kafka or Orwell dystopia. They both always tell Jackson they have the best intentions, and for much of the season he seems to believe them, then it slowly seeps in that they're looking out for The Lakers, not the team (if you get my drift, it's a money thing, basically) and that Jackson is clearly not on their side. They play antagonists, is not villains.
There are all kinds of tidbits about the league and the Lakers that I found interesting, but the book is kind of limited in that it's autobiographical and topical. This means that Jackson really can't burn too many bridges. Although he does blow up the Kobe bridge, then run over the pieces a couple of times with a steamroller, then break up the smaller chunks with a jackhammer, for everybody else in the book he has many comments, but nothing really damning. This keeps the narrative pretty light. I wanted to read tragedy--hubris, downfall, weeping, the whole bit, and I got all of those things, but it all felt a bit hollow. A lot like the hollow feeling I get when I realize that, from Bulgaria, I'm supporting I group of 12 guys I've only seen play together once and a coach I've never really liked all that much, just because they wear a purple and gold uniform. It makes me think, sure, but I know that I'll be watching every game I can when i get back to America, and loving it, as they say.
Posted by Rob at January 31, 2005 10:26 PM