Holiday Balls Roll And Bounce In

December 3, 2021December 3, 2021 by Woody

Jim Parker, my former longtime colleague in The Star sports department, lived up to his journalistic nickname “Swami” by peering deeply into his crystal ball and donating two basketballs seven months before my column ran kicking off “Woody’s Annual Holiday Sports Ball Drive.”

Also getting any early jump on the ball was JoAnn Bowen, who threw a party this summer to welcome home her granddaughter, Brooke, from Paris. JoAnn asked each reveler to bring a new sports ball and the result was 17 holiday gifts for local disadvantaged children.

More donations have begun to flood in…

Peggy and Paul Graham gave one football and one basketball; Karen and Dave Brooks kicked in two footballs, two basketballs, one soccer and one volleyball; and Peter Hochschild’s family donated a mix of 27 balls.

Some of the gifts for kids!

Ann Cowan donated 10 basketballs in honor of her late husband, Jim, who had done similarly for nearly two decades. Making it a family affair, John Cowan donated another five basketballs in remembrance of his dad “and the good times I had in VYBA and playing basketball all the way through high school.”

Kent Brinkmeyer passed in four basketballs; Lynn Kenton donated three basketballs; and Chuck Russell donated one basketball.

“When my two sons were growing up, I was fortunate to be able to provide the sports equipment they needed,” noted Kelly Lanier, who donated an assortment of 13 balls. “I hope these balls can help some boys and girls to be able to participate with the same joy and learn the same valuable lessons.”

The Lewis Family – Tom and Jan, and daughters Cory, Emily and Maddy – also donated 13 gifts, all basketballs while Sandra Janotta, and her coworkers at J & H Engineering, tossed in three volleyballs and two basketballs.

Despite being diagnosed with diabetes back in January; a month later being hospitalized for two weeks with COVID-19; then “hitting the trifecta,” as he puts it, with cancer surgery in September and now undergoing chemotherapy, Nick Sarris turned his focus off his own troubles to donate a cornucopia of 70 balls.

“It has been sort of overwhelming, but I will win,” Nick shared. “This whole health merry-go-round has been filled with uplifting positives in a bad situation – I have been carried on the shoulders of some wonderful people. The ball donation is just me relishing the chance to pay back some of the goodness/blessings I’ve received. It just might make some kid’s day a masterpiece.”

Nick’s generosity and positive attitude warmed my heart, but he also put tears in my eyes. Remembering a column I wrote back in July about my wife and I losing a child to a late miscarriage 18 years ago, a daughter we would have named Sienna, he noted: “My donation is in your Sienna’s honor. She is more than just a special memory, she is a source of goodness. She will be responsible for a few more smiles, which is always a good thing. Thank you for the opportunity to honor her and to provide a little happiness to other kids through her.”

There is still time to provide a little happiness to more kids by dropping off new sports balls at a local Boys & Girls Club, YMCA, church, youth group – or to Jensen Design & Survey at 1672 Donlon St. in Ventura, 93003 (9 a.m. to 5 p.m. through Dec. 15) and I’ll take it from there. Online orders can be shipped to the same address.

Also, please email me about your gift at woodywriter@gmail.com so I can add your generosity to this year’s growing tally.

* * *

Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram at @woodywoodburn. His SIGNED books are available at www.WoodyWoodburn.com.

Personalized Signed copies of WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece” and “Strawberries in Wintertime: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” are available at WoodyWoodburn.com

“Holiday Ball Drive” Kicks Off

November 28, 2021November 28, 2021 by Woody

Editorials are generally as disposable as the newsprint on which they are printed, and yet one that appeared in The New York Sun in 1897 might as well have been carved in granite because it remains relevant and favored well over a century later.

Headlined “Is There a Santa Claus?” it began with a letter from young Virginia O’Hanlon:

“Dear Editor –

“I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, ‘If you see it in The Sun, it’s so.’ Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?”

The Sun’s reply included the now famous line, “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus,” and continued: “He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence.”

A mountain of gifts from “Woody’s Holiday Ball Drive.”

Indeed, how dreary would the world be with no Virginias – and, alas! no Sarahs, Davids and Briannas. Those are the names of just three fabulous kids who have contributed in past years to “Woody’s Holiday Ball Drive” that kicks off once again today to give sports balls to local disadvantaged youth.

Indeed, 10-year-old Sarah emptied her “Jar of Chore Money”; 14-year-old David used his birthday gift cards; and 9-year-old Brianna collected and redeemed recyclables for a full year; all to buy a small sleighful of gift balls to donate.

The seed for this endeavor was planted about 25 years ago at a youth basketball clinic when former Ventura College and NBA star Cedric Ceballos awarded autographed basketballs to handful of lucky attendees. Leaving the gym afterward, I happened upon a 10-year-old boy who had won one of the prized keepsakes. . .

. . . which he was now dribbling on the rough blacktop outdoor court, and shooting baskets with, all while perhaps imagining he was Ceballos with the game clock ticking down to the final buzzer.

Meanwhile, the real Ceballos’ Sharpie signature was of course wearing off.

Curious as to why the boy had not carefully taken the trophy basketball home to put safely on a bookshelf, I interrupted his playing to ask.

“I’ve never had my own basketball,” he answered matter-of-factly between shots.

At Christmastime, visions of that boy – and other boys and girls like him, who don’t have their own basketball to shoot or soccer ball to kick or football to throw – danced through my head. So I asked you dear readers to help make the holidays happier and you responded like champions.

Once again, I am asking you to drop off new sports balls (no batteries required!) at a Boys & Girls Club, YMCA, fire department or house of worship. The organization’s leaders will see that they wind up in deserving young hands.

Also, through Dec. 15, you can handoff your bouncing gifts at Jensen Design & Survey at 1672 Donlon St. (weekdays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.) near Target on Telephone Road in Ventura; or have online orders shipped to the same address; and I will take it from there.

If you participate, please email me at woodywriter@gmail.com so I can add your generosity to this year’s tally.

Together, we can prove The Sun’s long-ago words still ring true: Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and ball-giving MVPs – Most Valuable Philanthropists – exist.

* * *

Thanksgiving Tale From Childhood

November 19, 2021 by Woody

Serendipity smiled, winked as well, and made me laugh earlier this week by bringing one of my favorite Thanksgiving memories to mind.

To begin, my two-weeks-shy-of-three-year-old granddaughter told me, with a grin and a giggle, all about “Pete The Blue Cat” who is a character in one of her books. It is actually from the award-winning “Pete the Cat” series by James and Kimberly Dean, but dear Maya calls him “Pete The Blue Cat” for obvious reasons.

I, in turn, shared with Maya a story about my grandparents’ cat, Pete, an orangey-blonde tabby who I obviously renamed “Pete The Orange Cat” in my retelling.

Before proceeding with that tale, let me share some further literary serendipity. The very day before Maya’s conversation about “Pete The Blue Cat,” I had read her a new book via video chat, as I often do, since she lives in the Bay Area.

Titled “I Want My Hat Back” by Jon Klassen, it won the Theodore Seuss Geisel Honor and is about a bear who, as you can guess, has lost his cap. Throughout the pages he asks a series of animals he encounters, “Have you seen my hat?”

The fox, frog, rabbit, turtle, snake and armadillo are of no help and eventually the bear laments: “Nobody has seen my hat. What if I never see it again? What if nobody ever finds it? My poor hat. I miss it so much.”

At long last, a deer asks the bear what his hat looks like.

“It is red and pointy and…” the bear answers.

Which brings me back to my Thanksgiving memory. We had enjoyed a full feast, complete with a variety of at least six home-baked pies because my Grandma Mabel loved to make everyone’s favorite, and were getting ready for the 45-mile drive home.

“I can’t find my hat,” six-year-old me announced with emergency in my voice.

I asked everyone – my two older brothers, younger sister, mom and dad, Mabel and Grandpa Ansel – if they had seen my hat, but no one had. No one needed to ask what my hat looked like because I wore the Davy Crockett coonskin cap, complete with ringed tail, everywhere except in the shower.

A search party was organized and the entire family looked low and high, upstairs and downstairs, with no luck. Pop, anxious to get on the road before the holiday traffic, and Ohio’s winter weather, got too bad, finally said we had to go.

Nobody has seen my hat, I surely sniveled. What if I never see it again? What if nobody ever finds it?

Grandpa soothed my woes by promising he would keep looking until he found it and would bring it when he and Mable came to our house for Christmas dinner. Trailing the rest of my family like a sad little caboose, I trudged towards the front door.

My poor hat. I miss it so much.

Suddenly, Mabel sang out excitedly, “Here it is! I found it!” She had spotted the tip of the tail of my coonskin cap poking out from beneath the dining room table’s formal tablecloth that draped all the way to the floor.

Mabel reached down to retrieve the Davy Crockett hat and . . .

. . . MEOWWW-HOWWWL!

She had yanked Pete The Orange Cat’s striped tail!

My pouty lower lip instantly gave way to laughter.

I won’t spoil the ending of the book “I Want My Hat Back” for you, but my tale of that long-ago Thanksgiving evening concluded with all of us giving belated thanks we weren’t Pete The Sore-Tailed Cat.

* * *

Hole Leads To Whole New Beauty

November 12, 2021November 13, 2021 by Woody

Imagine a teenager looking in the mirror while getting ready for prom and seeing an eyesore pimple. That’s the kind of chill I felt the other day when I put on my favorite pullover and spotted a small hole, impossible to miss, in the front.

Understand, I have had this wool, olive green, quarter-zipper, vintage Patagonia pullover for close to two decades, and have babied it for half that time trying to extend its life as long as possible. As a result, it has spent more time inside a dresser drawer than out in the world, which is not a good thing.

Also as a result, it has made more than its share of appearances at happy gatherings and special events, which is a good thing. The unsightly new blemish, however, promised to retire Ol’ Green from marquee billing.

While age finally claimed its youthful beauty, I did not want the small hole to get stretched and pulled and torn into a larger one. “A stitch in time saves nine” but, alas, my skill with needle and thread is limited to sewing a button back on a shirt. Meanwhile, my wife felt the emotional pressure of a surgeon being asked to operate on a loved one and begged out.

My next thought was to ask my dear Betsy Ross-like friend Kathy. I wish you could see her handiwork on Ol’ Green. Darned if her darning isn’t masterful. The interwoven needlework is nearly invisible.

In truth, I’m actually glad the repair is slightly visible. I say this after thinking about the Shakers who were renowned for their furniture design and craftsmanship, yet deliberately introduced a “mistake” into the things they made in order to show that man should not aspire to the perfection of God. Flawed, they believed, could be ideal.

Ol’ Green is now similarly ideal.

Navajos, echoing the Shakers, purposely weave a single imperfection into their handmade blankets. To their eyes this makes the blankets more, not less, beautiful. In his terrific book, “Blood and Thunder: The Epic Story of Kit Carson and the Conquest of the American West,” author Hamptom Sides elaborates on this mindset:

“Navajos hated to complete anything – whether it was a basket, a blanket, a song, or a story. They never wanted their artifacts to be too perfect, or too close-ended, for a definitive ending cramped the spirit of the creator and sapped the life from the art. So they left little gaps and imperfections, deliberate lacunae that kept things alive for another day.

“Even today Navajo blankets often have a faint imperfection designed to let the creation breathe – a thin line that originates from the center and extends all the way to the edge, sometimes with a single thread dangling from its border. Tellingly, the Navajos call the intentional flaw the ‘spirit outlet.’ ”

Henceforth, I will take the Shakers’ and Navajos’ perspectives to heart when I wear Ol’ Green and embrace its repaired imperfection as a “spirit outlet.”

“Kintsugi” also comes to my mind, which is the Japanese practice of repairing broken pottery with seams of gold and, in the process, making the object even more beautiful for having been broken. That is exactly how I feel about my beloved pullover.

From now on, instead of saving Ol’ Green for special occasions I am going to wear it regularly. And when future holes and “spirit outlets” appear, and surely they will, I may ask Kathy to perform her seamstress wizardry with gold thread instead of perfectly matched olive.

Ol’ Green-and-Gold will then be even more beautiful than ever.

* * *

Turning Fall Clock Way, Way Back

November 5, 2021November 5, 2021 by Woody

Clocks get turned back an hour Sunday, but a dear near-centenarian pen pal of mine jumped the gun by turning the calendar pages back many decades.

Actually, Doris is my “typewriter” pal for she always types her letters to me. She is a superb typist, by the way, with her most-recent two-page missive having only two corrections made in black pen – an extra s crossed out and a 9 turned into a 0 – which is about double her average of misstrikes.

I thought Doris’s latest delightful correspondence deserved a wider readership than just me, so here is an excerpted dose of Ventura history and nostalgia.

“You asked about the location of the high school campus, so I may just chatter here about the Ventura I remember. I was born up on a hill, Three Sisters Hospital or something like that.

“I attended the Mill School thru first grade, then E.P. Foster, then The Avenue School. That building was located sort of behind where Santa Clara and Main Street meet, and I do not know when it disappeared. Grades 7-10 and the last two years of high school were at the present-day Ventura High School building on Main Street.

“At that time the building also had JC classes. As you can imagine, for girls especially at about twelve years of age, going to another school where there were also SIXTEEN-year-old girls was a major adjustment. So there were sponsors (tenth-graders, of course, so very sophisticated and all) for the younger girls. I had one and later became one – recently an acquaintance told me her mom said I was her sponsor and she remembered me. I don’t even remember me at all at sixteen!!

“My dad was also born in Ventura. He was friends with so many people and it was enjoyable to feel like I had an extended family when I would walk down the street and an older person would say hi to me — especially Emilio Ortega, the handsome postmaster!

“I loved my childhood even with all of the ‘deprivations’ of the Depression and then World War II. We always had very little, didn’t need more, and if we had a bit less we didn’t notice. I do know it helped that my dad was always lucky to have a job, whereas so many were not so fortunate. He worked for the Southern Counties Gas Co., and we lived on Lewis Street, which was a very nice neighborhood.

“So, see what happens when you ask a simple question. In answer to your other question about my typewriter: Now I have a Lexmark (IBM) and I have no idea the year of its manufacture. I will have it go to the Neptune Society with me, it is so dear to me.

“At twelve, I received a Smith-Corona portable in a dandy case. I believe it went to college with my son Rick after I taught all of my kids to be handy with it and I moved along from Underwoods to IBMs — Selectrics and an Executive. I did have a computer, but had no room here for it and find I can live quite comfortably as long as this machine sticks with me.

“Sometime I will tell you about my experience typing the California Bar exam for a Stanford Law School graduate, way back in the mid-1950s.” Added in handwritten black ink: “He did pass!”

Typing again: “As you can see, these 96-year-old fingers are plum wore out!!”

Then, in closing, in Palmer Method cursive as smooth as warm maple syrup: “Love, Doris”

* * *

Happy For Trick-or-Treaters Return!

October 27, 2021October 27, 2021 by Woody

“If you can blow this balloon up with one breath you win a brand-new Cadillac,” the doctor told me just before I was to have my tonsils removed.

Considering I would not be old enough to get a driver’s license for another 12 years I would have preferred the promise of a toy Matchbox car. All the same, I accepted the challenge and inhaled the deepest breath of my young life . . .

. . . and woke up in a hospital bed wondering when the operation was going to happen.

“It’s all over,” my mom told me. “Do you want some ice cream to soothe your throat?”

I have since had more surgeries than I care to remember – wisdom teeth, kidney stone, entrapped nerve, deviated septum, cervical disc fusion – and each time I emerged from anesthesia’s fog I could not believe time had passed and the operation had already taken place.

That is sort of how I feel about the past year and half during the COVID-19 pandemic. Like it was spring of 2019 and I took a deep breath of anesthesia and suddenly I have awakened to autumn 2021.

Instead of having my tonsils or a kidney stone removed, I had birthday celebrations and holidays gatherings, concerts and vacations, all removed from the calendar. I bet you feel likewise.

Perhaps the best example I can give is a wedding of some young friends. One day my wife and I were ready to go to the big event and the next thing you know we were attending the reception for their pandemic-altered marriage ceremony that had actually taken place on Zoom over a year ago. And yet at the grand and greatly belated in-person celebration it seemed as if they had just said their vows minutes earlier.

I don’t know about you, but one of the biggest events I missed while being under pandemic-thesia was Halloween. Perhaps more than any holiday, Halloween is a time machine that transports me happily backwards. Hearing little voices sing “trick-or-treat” reminds me of walking my own two kids around the neighborhood.

Halloween also magically transports me to my own youth. Indeed, seeing a tiny Batman makes my mind flash back to when I taped a yellow bat insignia on a black sweatshirt and pinned a bath towel around my neck to go trick-or-treating when I was six. Age seven, too, for I loved Batman.

Trick-or-treaters at my front door pull up memories from a couple years later when my best friend Dan and I finished our rounds and then changed into second costumes before going back to the houses that were giving out full-sized candy bars.

Even my bad Halloween memories have become good ones with the passing of time. Like when Adam stole my pillowcase loaded with sugary bounty. To clarify, Adam wasn’t a boy bully, he was a black Labrador the size of a grizzly who lived in our neighborhood. Even though he was a gentle giant, when he came running at me I dropped my loot instead of taking any chances with his sweet tooth.

Because of coronavirus, not unleashed Adams, no little princesses and superheroes and goblins came knocking on my door last Halloween. Happily, this promises to change Saturday evening because the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has given children the green light to again go trick-or-treating.

I cannot wait. My porch light will be welcomingly on and I’ll have a wheelbarrow’s load of full-sized candy bars ready to hand out, two at a time, to make up for last year.

* * *

Two Tales: Impatience and Patience

October 23, 2021October 23, 2021 by Woody

Bookends often match, but not always, as was the case with the following two incidents that occurred on the same recent afternoon. The first bookend was Impatience, the second Patience.

I was third in line at a traffic light and when it turned green the car at the front did not take off like a drag racer so the driver in the car directly behind it honked. While rudely impatient, it was at least a polite single tap – beep! – as in: “Hey, look up from reading your texts and please go.”

The front car did not go.

A count of perhaps “one Mississippi, two Mississippi” passed before the second car honked again, twice, longer – beeeep-beeeep! – expressing growing agitation, like: “Come on, pal, it ain’t gonna get any greener!”

Still the front car remained stationary.

One more “Mississippi” passed and BEEEEEEP! PG-13 translation: “Come on, knucklehead! Wake the heck up! I don’t want to sit through another long red light because of you! Go already, go, Go, GO!”

By now I was muttering R-rated complaints at the front driver.

At long last, the front car started to move at a tortoise’s pace and about three angry heartbeats later the second car abruptly changed lanes and with a loud gunning of its engine bolted ahead like a high-octane dragster.

Now I was behind the slow-pokey car, but surprisingly it was the speedy racer I cursed silently with contempt. You see, displayed on the back of the front car was a bright yellow sticker the size of a dinner placemat and impossible to miss: “STUDENT DRIVER / Please be Patient.”

Arriving at my destination, having empathetically proceeded in no rush, I soon witnessed a remarkable display of patience and Good Samaritanship (that’s not a word, but should be). On one of my loops running around the soccer fields at the Ventura Community Park at Kimball Road, a middle-aged man stopped me and pointed towards the south parking lot.

“Is that your car?” he asked.

“No,” I said, adding curiously: “Why?”

Mr. Good Samaritan had found an electronic key fob and was trying to locate its owner. This was proving to be no small task for the key fob had been lost next to the sidewalk that runs the full perimeter of the park.

Specifically, Mr. Good Samaritan found it on the other side of the park about as far from the parking lots as can be. He could have left the fob where it was, hoping the owner would retrace his or her steps and find it. The problem was, the encircling sidewalk is 1.25-miles long making it almost a needle-in-a-haystack search.

Instead, he picked up the fob and started asking every adult walker, runner, dog owner and rollerblader he saw if it was theirs. Failing at this, Mr. Good Samaritan wisely figured that locating the car might help him find its owner upon return. He thus began pressing the “unlock” button while listening for a high-pitched beep.

Coming up empty in the north lot near the aquatics center, he next tried the south one and finally found the winning SUV. Stationed here he patiently continued his search for the owner with no success.

An hour, at least, after most people would have given up, Mr. Samaritan left a note on the windshield explaining he was leaving the key fob inside at the swimming complex.

I will tell you this: If I ever lose my car key, I know whom I want to find it.

By the way, when I finished my run the SUV was happily gone.

* * *

Sunshine All Wrong On Sad Day

October 15, 2021 by Woody

This past Tuesday was as beautiful a day as one can imagine, early autumn laced with a lingering trace of summer, the cloudless sky as blue as Paul Newman’s eyes.

It was all wrong.

Dawn should have arrived leaden overcast and gloomy. Afternoon should have been windy and cold. The evening sky should have cracked with thunder and lightning.

At the very least, birds should have taken the day off from song; flowers should have closed their blooms; the night stars refused to twinkle.

Suz Montgomery, a Renaissance woman and local shero, succumbed to cancer Tuesday after fiercely battling the heinous-and-heartless disease into remission time and again for nearly a decade.

It is a cliché to say Suz packed two lifetimes into her 73 years. It would also be an understatement – three lifetimes is more like it. Here is a one-deep-breath biography of the longtime Ventura resident: lifetime learner and educator, tireless advocate for the elderly and energetic champion for youth, host of the “Schmooze with Suz” talk show on local television, green-thumbed gardener and marvelous Italian chef, warrior of justice fighting for the homeless and mentally ill, and, of course, mother, wife, grandmother, and dear friend to about a million people.

In my favorite photograph with Suz, we are embraced in a hug as tight as two best friends who have not seen each other in ages even though our absence had not been long at all. Her face is turned toward the camera with a smile as wide as the 805 area code and as bright as a spring day. Her eyes twinkle with delight. She is so beautiful you probably would not even notice that chemotherapy had once again stolen her hair.

What is most special about this picture is that most everyone who knew Suz has a similar photo overflowing with her love. Indeed, Suz had a way of making everyone in her life feel like they were her dearest friend. That is no small gift.

A recent gift Suz gave me, and which I believe because of its timing she wished for me to share with the world after she left us, were these ten life lessons she believed in and put into practice:

“There is no such thing as a mistake – it’s an opportunity to learn a new lesson. (Especially helpful in teaching kids.)

“Every day is a miracle – you simply need to look beyond the moment and see beyond.

“The time to do the right thing is always NOW!

“Judge your friends by the size of their hearts.

“Give to the world the best that you have and the best will come back to you.

“Grandparents are the best teachers without fear or filters.

“Trust your heart to make the right choice, not your head.

“You can always begin again.

“Serving others is the best of self – everyone WINS!

“It’s not always what you do now, it’s what you leave behind that matters.”

Thanks to the size of her heart and her passion for serving others, Suz undeniably leaves behind a legacy that matters.

You remember funny things at a time like this. A few years ago, on a drizzly day, Suz sent me this message: “Hon, have a great run today! I, too, once loved running in the rain – made me feel like I was five years old at recess.”

This is all the more reason why the sunshine seemed so wrong on the day Suz passed away at sunrise, for I could not help but imagine her running in the rain again, finally free from pain.

* * *

Readers’ Ali Memories & Postscript

October 8, 2021 by Woody

My recent reminiscences of Muhammad Ali, who passed way five years ago and boxed his final bout 40 years past, resulted in a flurry of responses from readers whose own memories of “The Greatest” have not faded over time. Here are a few…

“Fifty-one years ago on October 1st, 1975, I was at ‘The Thriller in Manila’! Ali v. Frazier. I was in the Navy and still have my ticket stub framed and hanging on my wall at home,” John Tunigold wrote with an attached photo of the cherished memorabilia – a very simple, nearly square, black-printed manila-colored ticket “No. 25340” elegantly preserved behind glass.

“I was straight out of high school, Class of ’73 at Hueneme High, joined the Navy and caught the end of the Vietnam War. In April 1975, we took approximately 3,000 Vietnamese refugees to the Philippines when Saigon fell.

“At the time I didn’t realize the historical significance of everything going on, including the Ali fight. President Ferdinand Marcos and his wife were there and got introduced to the crowd in the auditorium. We got tickets through special services and as you can imagine they were way up high, ‘nose bleed’ seats.”

“I saw Ali at the Del Amo Mall in Torrance, trying to do magic tricks at a time when it was obvious Parkinson’s was ravaging him,” Bill Cizek wrote, adding with melancholy: “Kids were pointing at the rubber sleeve over his thumb from which he pulled out the long ‘magic scarf.’ It made me feel sad, but I also had to admire him for making appearances in his condition, trying to stay connected to his fans.”

Robert Raven Kraft shared some memories from Miami where “The Champ” often trained: “I saw Ali in my neighborhood by the 5th Street gym. My boxer friends all knew him.

“My mom was the cashier at the drugstore he ate at and she talked to him all the time and also got to meet his mom. My mom’s famous line was that Ali told his mother, ‘This is the lady that takes all my money’ and my mom replied, ‘I wouldn’t take all your money if you weren’t treating all your friends.’

“I even ran three blocks with him in 1975. I wish I still had the autographed picture he signed to me as Cassius Clay in 1962.”

Lastly, to borrow the signature phrase of the late, great radio broadcaster Paul Harvey, “And now the rest of the story . . .”

In 1996, seven months after my six-year-old son playfully pulled away his outstretched palm and teasingly sing-sang “Too slow!” when Ali whiffed – and then laughed – trying to give him five, I attended assemblies at two inner-city high schools where the living legend gave 3,000 students copies of his then-new book “HeALIng: A Journal of Tolerance and Understanding.”

Afterwards, in a private reception, Ali caught my eye across a crowded room and motioned me over. When I arrived, he held out his hand, hip high and palm down, and said almost inaudibly: “You got a boy?”

I nodded, stunned. Ali replied with a smile, clearly remembering the boyish prank pulled on him. Without another whispered word, he took a pen in his Parkinson’s-trembling hand and with difficulty opened a copy of “HeALIing.”

“His name is Greg,” I said.

The “Too Greg” is in seismographic script, and the drawn heart Ali sometimes added when he was not in a hurry is hard to make out, but the signature is smooth and true and as beautiful as the memory it summons.

* * *

Part 2: Little Man and ‘The Greatest’

October 1, 2021 by Woody

As shared here last week, Ken Burns’ newest documentary film “Muhammad Ali” rekindled some of my own memories with “The Greatest” during my many years as a sports columnist.

Before concluding my tale, let me recap briefly. Exactly 25 years ago, I attended the National Sports Collectors Convention and brought along my six-year-old son. On our two-hour drive to the Anaheim Convention Center I told Greg that Ali was nicknamed “The Greatest” and shared a few stories.

My press pass gained me easy access behind the velvet ropes, but a security guard with the disposition of a junkyard dog insisted Greg could not accompany me without a ticket. Admission was pricey so I told my son to patiently wait just outside the ropes where I could see him – and he in turn could see Ali from afar – and I would be back as soon as possible.

Muhammad Ali lighting the torch at the 1996 Summer Olympic Games.

Barely had I settled into a folding chair right beside The Champ when my son silently sidled up to me. When the junkyard dog had turned to growl at someone else, Greg sneaked in and for the next half hour we hung out with Muhammad Ali as he signed autographs and posed for pictures.

Finally, I told my son it was time to leave.

“Not yet,” he whispered, and loudly. “I’ve gotta say ‘Hi.’ ”

Ali heard the little boy’s protests and swiveled toward Greg, who instinctively stepped forward and extended his right hand. Ali gently shook the tiny offering in his big paw and for the very first time all afternoon the man who used to “float like a butterfly” broke out of his cocoon of total silence.

“Hi, Little Man,” Ali whispered, hoarsely, spreading his arms wide open.

A second later, The Little Man was wrapped in a bear hug. Goodness it was cool. But an even more magical moment was yet to come.

After a standing eight-count, or maybe even the full ten seconds for a knockout, Ali eventually released the Little Man and then held out his giant hand, shaking slightly from Parkinson’s Syndrome, palm up in the universal “give me five” position.

The boy, who at that age would enthusiastically smack palms hard enough to “sting like a bee,” this time slapped ever so gently before in turn holding out his own tiny palm for The Champ to return the gesture.

Ali took a swipe . . .

. . . and missed!

Because at the very last instant, the Little Man, as he loved to do, pulled his hand away like a matador’s red cape teasing a bull.

“Too slow,” the Little Man said, his two missing front teeth causing the words to lisp slightly. Like, “Tooooth looowww.” Like Ali’s own soft voice that by then, at age 54 going on 94, lisped slightly.

And like two six-year-olds they laughed together at the prank.

While still roaring with delight, Ali once again opened his wingspan fully and my son once again stepped into his open arms, except this time the shy boy squeezed back, and tightly. Ali’s eyes caught mine and I swear to this day they twinkled.

It was an end-of-a-movie fadeout and roll-the-credits hug. A full thirty-second hug. A worth-the-two-hour-drive-in-Southern-California-gridlocked-freeway-traffic hug.

A hug from “The Greatest” that the Little Man, now a six-foot-three-tall man, still remembers warmly and surely will until he is an old man.

As we walked away hand-in-hand after saying goodbye to Ali, my son stopped short and looked up at me with a Christmas-morning smile, sans two missing front teeth, and said: “You were right, Dad—he really is The Bestest.”

* * *

WOODY WOODBURN

Writer, "Streaker" & Speaker

Category Archives: Columns

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“Holiday Ball Drive” Kicks Off

Thanksgiving Tale From Childhood

Hole Leads To Whole New Beauty

Turning Fall Clock Way, Way Back

Happy For Trick-or-Treaters Return!

Two Tales: Impatience and Patience

Sunshine All Wrong On Sad Day

Readers’ Ali Memories & Postscript

Part 2: Little Man and ‘The Greatest’