The trick is to use the dork in all of us the first time

Great artists don’t paint every day and deep thinkers mostly cogitate and vegetate because, just like athletes and race horses, the mind can only go full speed every once in a while. Last Monday and Tuesday I was at the microphone rocking my stories at the WGMD sports boosters banquet and then the girl’s state championship lacrosse banquet the next night.

Public speaking is the No. 1 fear and phobia of most people, a fear that escaped me like comprehension of calculus. But now I’m back with my dogs who don’t want to listen to any story that doesn’t start with the question, “Do you want a doughnut?”

WRITE RIGHT - I would like to find the composers of creative passages on the SAT verbal exam and smack them all in the head - or is that heads? The writing is designed to confuse, alienate or otherwise befuddle half the young people who read it, many of whom have an attitude of disgust by the time the story fizzles like skittles on a hot tongue.

The test is culturally biased and has a bias against the working class and blue collar real people. It’s like listening to Sunday morning NPR and getting all giddy over word puzzles. And so people cheat by using stand-ins or stunt doubles or whatever you want to call them. The trick is to use the dork in all of us the first time; otherwise, when the score improves from a 300 to a 600 on the second try the computer will tilt like a fat aunt on a slanted sidewalk.

Memphis is being investigated because one-and-done college student Derrick Rose is suspected of using an imposter to take his SAT and this, no doubt, certainly happened and happens a lot. But if the athlete is only staying for a year, what difference does it make? Personally, I think the SAT should be jettisoned on the next space shuttle and allow universities to accept and reject whomever they want for whatever reason.

RUNNING DOWN A DREAM – Saturday, June 13, is the sixth DFRC Blue-Gold 5K starting from Irish Eyes in Lewes along the canal. The race starts at 7:30 a.m. There is a big field for parking, so just follow directions for once in your life. And bring a chair for the post-game hang-about festivities. This event is run in support of the Delaware Blue-Gold All-Star football game held the end of June.

On Sunday, June 14, is the inaugural Outlet Liquors 5K which begins at 8 a.m. on McKinley Street at northbeach and is part of the Seven Sisters summer racing series.

TRADITION - Pete Coveleski was the left-handed quarterback on the 1979 Cape Henlopen state championship football team. Thirty years later his daughters Jackie and Kaci were on Cape’s state championship girls lacrosse team - pretty cool stuff. Forty years of Cape athletics has produced 10 state titles in girls sports. Five of those were in track and cross country. The remaining three are girls tennis 1991, basketball 1973 and lacrosse 2009.

The boys teams have won 24 titles with 16 coming in cross country and track and field. There have been five titles in lacrosse; basketball generated two and one championship came in football. That’s 34 total titles with 21 coming in cross country and track and field.

I coached a track team in 1976 that won a championship. That Monday in late May with no banquet planned, the team ran the trophy down Savannah Road, around the parking lot of Shields Elementary School then down Second Street finally ending on Lewes Beach. We chanted the entire time: “State champs! State champs!” And then we all - each and every one - went into the water. Chico Beckett turned to me and said, “Coach Fred, this town ain’t never seen this many black people in the water at one time,” and then he added, “and this ain’t even the colored beach.”

DENIAL - When the brain sees something that doesn’t fit into the natural order of sights, we have seen the first response is to say, “No way.” Last Wednesday I was talking with my longtime buddy Garland Ayers in the Tom Best parking lot. He was telling me about the 1984 Cape class reunion at the Cape Henlopen State Park this July. Garland invited me; just in case no funny people show up I can tell stories.

And then a Ford Ranger pickup with a young driver rolled past us. The man had a freshly killed squirrel hanging from his front bumper, an actual noose around its neck.

“That boy must really hate squirrels” is all I could think of to say before buying more sunflower seed to feed the family of 65 that live in the treetops behind my house.

SNIPPETS - Two of my sports beat buddies, race director Wayne Kursh - seven weeks out - and fitness trainer Dave Kergaard - one week out - are now on the far side of hip replacement surgery while I am swinging the weighted bat of anxiety in the on-deck circle waiting for my turn on July 16. Turns out everyone I speak with has a relative with a new hip, but once you get that hang-from-the-rearview-mirror wheelchair pass, no one is giving it up. I prefer to use a press pass on the dash, or if it’s really serious I have an official clergy pass.

I saw two short and stout cigarette-smoking women snag a handicapped spot in front of Marshall’s. They got out as the car sighed in relief, then cast their butts to the wind and the cigarettes, too. “Go on with your bad selves” is all I could think of to say other than, “Go on now, git!”