After 22 years of being a disappointment to others in so many things, I suddenly demonstrated a secret self I had known was there all along. Nobody was more shocked than I was when I won.
I didn’t just win. I dominated the field so resoundingly it seemed as if it had not even been a fair competition at all. Then, when it couldn’t possibly get any better, I got down into the pit that was staged for entertainment and threw the top twenty competitors out. There was only one man left in there. Not the person I had been born as. It was the Neanderthal and apparently the poor lad had been harboring a bit of passive-aggressive rage for quite some time. It all came out in one day between dawn and dusk. Those Neanderthals must have memories like elephants and it was obvious the troubled guy had been looking to get even for about 22 years.
Fort Riley, Kansas is the home of the Big Red One, the first Infantry Division. When I got there in 1983, I immediately noticed the differences in general morale from the unit I left in Europe 1981-1983, 1/83rd Baumholder Field Artillery. Fort Riley did not have anything like the criminal undercurrent that characterized the unit I had come from overseas - where the gangsters actually ran the outfit. (Much like today, in fact.)
If you want to know why my win that day was the feel-good blockbuster crowd pleaser get-on-your-feet-and-cheer hit of the summer in 1985, you have to know some background about my life up to that point. I will try to summarize it here because it foreshadows everything that happened on that day.
The reality is, I won because I wanted my coach in high school to know his instincts were right about me. It flattered me and I dearly loved him. I thought he was one of the finest people I had ever known, right up there with Hutchinson Persons, Oliver Williams and Rohan Rathan. Coach Granger Ancarrow seemed to me when I was a teenager to eclipse every other man I had met in life up to that point. The rest of them were fake and ghey as far as I was concerned. I made it a point to ignore them and avoid them, believing they were all like my father and I should not let their bad habits and vulgar nature rub off on me. When I met Granger I instantly saw he was radically different from the others. I know now that Granger had a lot of Neanderthal genes and that was what created the rapport from the instant I met him. Look at his photo and you’ll see exactly what I am talking about. That weird curly hair with the Indian cowlicks, the high cheekbones and large volume brain. Stiff shelf to the upper jaw, big forehead. Long before I ever said it, many people had commented on the resemblance back in the 70’s. Some people had affectionately called him “The Neanderthal” on more than one occasion when he wasn’t around.
Funny how I can barely remember anyone at that school other than the principal. I just get that autistic blur when I try to think of their faces, a shapeless blob of dough with a haircut. The coach is always in sharp focus for me like I saw him ten minutes ago. Odd that. Cannot even really recall my fake girlfriend Cynthia or anything other than their hair colors. Thought Cindy was pretty. Probably could not pick her out of a lineup today.
Coach Ancarrow had noticed after I won first place in my age division in the 1976 Shockoe Slip Marathon. While at school I was so proud of my platinum cup I carried it around with me to show to others. Ancarrow had been told by all the normies I was some kind of weirdo and that he should not approach me. He ignored them and decided to recruit me to his cross-country team, well known in that region for being champions as a result of his amazing coaching methods.
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