1. Here's what I enjoy about Patrick O'Brian's portrayal of Jack Aubrey: he is polished and rough. He loves classical music and plays the violin, is intellectually curious, and, while clumsy when it comes to figures and mathematical calculations on paper, can make instantaneous nautical calculations about his ship's behavior, not only on the spur of the moment, but in the heat of battle. At the same time, he over serves himself alcohol, makes coarse comments (he had to escorted out of one social occasion thanks to his loose and offending tongue), and, well, when it comes to his relations with women, chastity is not one of his chief virtues. He can be compassionate, but is unmoved by watching men under his command be flogged. His lieutenant, James Dillon, accuses him of being reckless in his pursuit of prizes at sea, but then suggests he's a coward when he has his ship retreat when his small ship and crew are overmatched by an enemy ship.
In other words, the suspense of this novel -- and possibly of the nineteen Jack Aubrey/Stephen Maturin novels to follow -- is built, in part, upon not knowing how Jack Aubrey will respond (or react) to situations at sea and on land, but, as a reader, I'm always confident that Patrick O'Brian has not created a single-dimensional character who will always act virtuously or heroically, but sometimes will. (By the way, in the spirit of many epic stories, O'Brian's novel demonstrates that ideals like virtuous and heroic are never fixed ideals, but are mutable.)
2. Sometimes I daydream about when I was on the Kellogg Wildcat basketball team (1969-72). My daydreams often focus on our games with teams that creamed us, especially Coeur d'Alene (although the Wildcats beat them in '72), Moscow (the Wildcats nearly beat them at districts in '72), Ferris, and Shadle Park. I try to imagine ways we might have been better coached, better conditioned, used different strategies, something, to have played better against the teams that drubbed us.
Then I remember the vertigo.
In consecutive games -- in fact, the first two games of the 70-71 season (my junior year) --, I was a starter and we lost to both Coeur d'Alene and Ferris by 50+ points, surrendering over 100 points both nights. Keep in mind, these games were only 32 minutes long. For a basketball team to score over 100 points is a remarkable feat.
As both of these games unfolded, the superior speed, size, conditioning, and experience combined with these teams' blanketing defense, dizzied me.
I don't know if any of my teammates experienced this (I was, admittedly, a soft player), but as these teams scored at will from the perimeter and in the post, as they snatched nearly every one of our missed shots and raced far faster than us to their own basket and scored one unchallenged basket after another, I could hardly tell up from down. My mind was scrambled, my body was shutting down, I had no wind, and, a couple of times, I wanted to vomit.
I bring this up because late this afternoon, I went to Kellogg High School and watched the Wildcat varsity boys get trounced by Moscow. Now, Moscow didn't score 100 points -- the final score was 61-39 -- but, Moscow's coach pulled his first string pretty early in both the second and fourth quarters and Kellogg tried to slow things down when in possession of the ball. These factors kept the score down to some degree.
But, watching Moscow's starters dominate Kellogg with their far superior height, inside scoring, outside shooting, and speed brought back memories of when I experienced similar mismatches.
I couldn't tell if any of the Kellogg players felt dizzy and disoriented, but watching them struggle tonight made me think my daydreams, while fun to play out in my mind, really are fanciful. And while some fans around me were grumbling about how the hometown squad couldn't rebound missed shots or got hassled into turnovers or were unable to defend Moscow's ability to score from the point, the wings, the pivot, and on putbacks, I felt something like empathy for the 'Cats.
For me, playing against a taller, quicker, faster, better shooting, and better defending team was demoralizing and disorienting and it helped me put my own experience in a clearer perspective to watch the Bears dismantle the Wildcats this evening.
I should add, before tonight, Kellogg had won their last four games, beating St. Maries, Wallace, Bonners Ferry, and Sandpoint. I saw the 'Cats play Wallace and Bonners Ferry. Kellogg disrupted these teams, pressed them, rebounded well, and scored off of steals and turnovers. Against Moscow's superior ball handlers and speed, Kellogg didn't apply full court pressure. (I think this was a good move.) Against Wallace and Bonners Ferry, Kellogg was looking to speed up the game, create chaos. Tonight, Kellogg didn't want to speed up Moscow. They tried to slow them down, but Kellogg is not a very good outside shooting team (especially with Graden Nearing out injured) and so their longer possessions often ended in heavily contested shots inside and missed shots from the perimeter, often triggering Moscow's fast break.
Kellogg plays Priest River next and it will be a much better game for the Wildcats.
3. After the game, Ed and I met for a couple of cocktails at the Lounge. We had a great time yakkin' with each other, having a fun visit with Val, joking around with Cas, and enjoying tonight's good vibes. Afterward, I checked in with Christy and Everett and watched the last seven minutes or so of Gonzaga's thumping of Pacific and my busy mind once again returned to thumpings I experienced nearly fifty years ago as a Wildcat and I once again felt some of the pain the current Wildcat squad must have felt tonight at The Drew.
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