So, Dice-K will be the starter in tonight’s ALCS game seven, giving the Japanese wunderkind an opportunity to justify his $100 million contract.
Consistent with the theme, “The Pursuit of Happyness”, the semi-fictionalized account of a year in the life of now-wealthy stockbroker Chris Gardner, was shown on cable last night.
Americans love hard-luck stories with happy endings, but the lead characters in both of these tales of the city are about as far from the mainstream as you can get: a mega-talented Asian ballplayer and an extraordinarily gifted African-American who got some equally extraordinary breaks.
They probably represent about 1/10 of 1% of the population in terms of their natural talent and abilities. And, did you notice, both are male. No bombing and killing of their supporters by misogynistic crackpots such as we saw in Pakistan earlier this week following the return of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, and no trashing of their work history and character such as we hear daily from the jealous anti-Hillary Clinton lunatics on talk radio.
Certain major details of Chris Gardner’s real life are quite different from the trials and tribulations of his character, brilliantly played by Will Smith.
Still, being a single parent, I related to a number of scenes in the film that are real. For example, at one point, Peter and I did live in a motel when we moved to Seattle right after I graduated from college, and for the first decades of my working life, I also ran for buses and subway trains, sometimes with my little guy in tow.
Albeit the reasons were different, I also experienced bigoted malevolence similar to that of the Dean Witter training manager, who tried to undermine Chris Gardner’s performance by singling him out for demeaning, time-wasting errands like fetching coffee and donuts.
Looking back, it would be nice to have really succeeded in the material sense, amassing a big portfolio and multiple houses same as the gentlemen in these stories. As an old friend of mine once said, though, those of us who started behind the eight ball aren’t required to measure our successes in those terms.
Most of us are still writing chapters for our own books, and as long as we can walk, talk and take nourishment, there’s still time for a few more happy endings.