Martin Dugard's Blog, page 16

I can't imagine a better demonstration of civil liberty than police allowing demonstrators armed with loaded automatic weapons to rally on the capitol steps in an attempt to intimidate legislators. Any other country on earth would throw them in a gulag, level their homes, and salt the earth. Ironically, they are demonstrating over their lack of civil liberties.

Callie and I saw a few demonstrators out here last week, angry about the beaches being closed. It came during our new habit of driving to see our parents each Saturday (masks, social distancing, etc.), then continuing to the beach for a drive down PCH. The protestors were angry and organized, with signs that were a little too perfect. Once, many years ago in London, I watched a rally of some sort marching through Piccadilly Circus. Hundreds of people, if not a thousand, all carrying professionally printed signs. This took away the legitimacy of their protest in my mind, because someone had to pay for those expensive signs. It was like that with the beach protesters. No hand printed signs, but a whole lot of professional-grade placards, including one stating "I Deserve The Right To Work" held by a preppy little shit who looked like a trust fund baby who's never worked a day in his life.

I digress. The drive down the coast has become a Saturday routine, just like the Wednesday afternoon coaches meeting (masks, social distancing, etc.) in my backyard has become a weekly tent pole bringing forth community and a sense of normalcy. It gives us all something to look forward to. Yesterday's drive stretched six hours, taking Callie and I from RSM to Irvine (my Dad's house) to Anaheim Hills (Calene's Dad's) to Orange (Calene's Mom's) to Costa Mesa (El Toro Bravo, home of the carnitas tacos) to Newport Beach, all on back roads. No freeways. That's the rule. Then it's PCH to San Clemente and back to RSM, where it's time to see if Selma's has tapped the Pliny keg. I've been ghosting a book that I can't talk about for the last two months. Friday was the deadline, which I hit at 3 p.m. So Saturday's drive was also a time of resurfacing for mental clarity after those weeks writing in the first-person voice of someone famous (not my Killing co-author), which can be a little confusing to the creative process.

I don't know what life would be like without those Saturday drives and Wednesday coaches meetings. I'd probably be out there with those protesting yahoos, swinging an automatic weapon around my neck. I'm lucky to have a career that lets me work at a time like this, and lucky to be sharing this space with Calene, two dogs, a 19-year-old cat that will live forever, and whichever of our three sons chooses to drop by for the weekend. So I'm focusing on gratitude instead of protesting.

I was feeling a little funky the other day, the black dog of depression sitting on my chest. It seems ethereal and touchy-feely, but I mentally started giving thanks for all the many wonderful things that make up life as we know it. Completely reversed my mindset. The black dog wandered away, if only for a while. As Churchill once said,

"When you find yourself walking through hell, keep walking."

Sound advice. This isn't hell. Really, it isn't. There are wonders to be found in times like these, like the group of teenagers picking wildflowers on Mother's Day in the absence of florists. Better to focus on beautiful moments like that than walk around literally half-cocked.

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Wags and Wiggles, the local doggie day care, reopened this week — and not a moment too soon. Django was getting the same cabin fever as the rest of us, despite more trips to the dog park than he'd ever experienced. He's a hound and alert barker, with a propensity for taking personal responsibility for our safety and well-being, patrolling the backyard and howling at any perceived threats. Having us around the house 24-7 put him on high alert. He's adorable but anxious, and finally getting the chance to once again hang out with a bunch of dogs all day has calmed him down a bunch.

Which is also a way of saying there's light at the end of the tunnel. The big chain gym in town has closed and filed for bankruptcy, but the small local gym has reopened, though under strict regulations that we all wear masks and stay ten feet apart. Working out on the jungle gym at the local middle school has been fun, but there's only so many pull-ups and body weight squats a man can do before the need for actual weights (and air conditioning in this 95-degree week) makes itself known. Likewise, Board n Brew, the local go-to sandwich shop and craft beer emporium (I am not fond of the word "emporium" but it called out to me, and I honestly couldn't think of anything better) opens May 15. I've gotten in the habit of finishing my workout at RSM Intermediate with a sandwich and Coke Zero at Board N Brew, which is a nice reward combo. But I'll be glad when the BnB attendance is more of the sort involving sitting down at the counter for a double IPA and sports on the big screen. I should say that Board N Brew has been kind enough to sell takeout beer in Mason jars, which is just the sort of business ingenuity the world needs at a time like this.

But there's still uncertainty. I still need to go on the road to research the next book, which honestly can't be written without some boots on the ground reporting. Who knows when the world will reopen to travel. And although we had a virtual team meeting yesterday, it remains to be seen when and if there will be a cross country season. It had been my intention to take a gap year from coaching after my All-American senior graduated, just so I could see whether or not I could live without it. But that gap year occurred this season. So now I know what that's like to not click the stopwatch every afternoon, and I can honestly say I'd like to keep at it a few years more — and win a few more championships. My dad coached until he was 87, so there's the example to follow. The school that fired me for being outspoken a few months ago is in my sights as I rebuild the program at my new school, but revenge is a shallow and short-term emotion. The reasons I want to coach are to connect and teach, riding the roller-coaster of emotions that accompanies a season of sport. With any luck, we start practice on June 15. That day can't come soon enough.

In the meantime, the reopening is happening. Slowly, but it’s on. It's sad to know we will be counting the casualties of businesses that will never reopen, with lost jobs and empty storefronts, while also reconnecting with those that survive. The landscape will be forever altered, one way or the other. Then, and only then, will we know what the new normal looks like.

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A long time ago, on an overnight flight back in the days when in-flight entertainment was limited to one movie and a few random channels of music options, I wrestled with a sleepless moment in a darkened United cabin and searched for music that would help me shut my eyes for a few hours. I settled on opera, believing that songs performed in a language I did not know would help me shut out the world.

The moment was a one-off. I never actually went to an opera after that night, though I remember the music as a revelation. Baz Luhrman's La Bohème on Broadway was as close as I got to seeing a performance. But as the walls began closing in last week I purchased a download of Renee Fleming performing with the London Philharmonic. The opera crowd isn't the sort to use the term "Greatest Hits," but this album is opera's greatest hits. I play it in the car when I am alone, driving around my little town, careful to keep the windows rolled up at stoplights because I don't think RSM is ready for loud opera on the corner of Antonia and Banderas (an actual cross street).

But we're ready for something. This burg is getting twitchy. Not like down at the beach, where protesters are driving in from hours away to be heard. One such man from the town of Lancaster, 70 miles north of Huntington Beach, drove down to protest beach closures, claiming it violated his 2nd Amendment rights ("A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed"). These are the times we live in, and his vote counts as much as mine. The quarantine cabin fever is making us all a little daft, and even though I have the perfect job for a time like this, I admit to waking up blue each morning, longing for normalcy and the ability to plan the future.

In the meantime, there are moments that will define all this for my town. The seasonal creek down in the arroyo is an inch deep and 30 feet wide, but that doesn't stop entire families from trekking down the sycamore-shade trails, past the rattlesnakes and coyotes, then allowing their children to roll around in the water like it’s the Colorado. And bikes. Man, do we have bikes. I think we all knew in our hearts that everyone owns a bike, but until now the only people we saw on bikes were the roadies with their expensive carbon frames and the weekend mountain bike wolf packs. Not anymore. I literally saw a grown man riding a child's Stingray with the elevated handlebars and handle grip streamers on the trail this week. Bikes of all sizes and riders of all abilities are everywhere. It’s comical and endearing, and somehow beautiful.

But this week has been special to me for two more specific moments that will stay with me a lifetime. The first came on Wednesday, when a group of runners drove past my home in a long single file parade of cars, honking their horns to offer encouragement to coaches who have lost a track season. My next door neighbor, tipped off to the surprise, played "We Are The Champions" over the outdoor loudspeakers usually reserved for country.

And then there was last night, when my oldest son and his aircrew used their training mission to circle his helicopter over the house as Callie and I sat in the backyard. I worry about all my sons at a time like this, and to see that 60 flying overhead made me cheer. Though Dev has been a Navy pilot for several years, that was the first time I had ever seen him fly. Social distancing has never been so uplifting.

I played some opera this afternoon as I made my usual Sunday rounds (run in the park, Pavilions to shop for dinner, Selma's for a growler pour, then home). This is my new routine. Normally, I'd be blasting Springsteen but these are different times. Renee Fleming's Greatest Hits is my coronavirus jam.

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