Not sad in the sense that anything drastic or horrible happened to me or my family.
Not sad because someone hurt my feelings.
Not sad for any real, personal, reasons.
Yet, it was sad none the less.
Evel Knievel died on Friday, and that makes me sad.
I started thinking about Evel, when I heard the news, and that sent me back to my childhood.
I can remember, pretty clearly, Saturday afternoons spent in front of the family TV, watching ABC's Wide World of Sports.
That's how I was introduced to Evel Knievel. I remember watching him do his daring stunts on TV and thinking how I wished I could do that.
I wished I could jump all those buses on a motorcycle.
I wished I could jump the fountain at the casino.
I wished I could jump the Snake River*...of course, so did he!
I remember talking about Evel (even his name was cool then!) to my friends, all the time. If I had a dime for everytime I told some one 'He broke every bone in his body at least once!', I wouldn't be rich, but it would be a Merry Christmas!
The cool thing about these kinds of trips down memory lane, is that they usually don't stop there....with what brought you. So it was with me.
I kept thinking about those Saturday afternoons...how many cool or interesting things I used to see. You never knew what you'd get:
The Harlem Globetrotters
Muhammad Ali and Howard Cosell (DOWN GOES FRASIER!!! DOWN GOES FRASIER!!!)
Gymnastics
Figure Skating
and all started with those famous words by Jim McKay (I can still hear him now):
Spanning the globe to bring you the constant variety of sport… the thrill of victory… and the agony of defeat… the human drama of athletic competition… this is ABC's Wide World of Sports!
Cool thing about that is, when they said 'agony of defeat', they always showed a picture of this poor fellow, Vinko Bogataj, crashing down a ski jump. My uncle was there, under that ramp and saw the whole thing live. How cool is that!?!?
At the end of the weekend, I realized, 'Yeah, I'm sad that Evel died'. I'm sad for his family, particularly Robbie, who have to deal with this loss. My prayers go out to them.
However, it was a bittersweet sadness. I liked remembering. I liked thinking about those simple times when I was young and I'd put a board over some bricks and pretend I was jumping 25 buses instead of 25 Hot Wheels Cars.
I liked watching Ali beat someone up, or Nadia Comaneci win gold medals, or the Medowlark Lemon toss in a half court hook shot (swish) to beat the Washington Generals (again!).
So, once again, Evel Knievel delivers...if not through the exhilaration of some daring jump, then through a genteel trip down memory lane.
*I think this is also when Evel Jumped the Shark!
