Caught between a Rocco and a hard place
By Kyle Moylan, Sports Editor
I was at the Trenton Thunder playoff game last Thursday with a couple of friends, trying to figure out which of the three of us had gone the most blind.
As another friend of mine points out on an almost daily basis as he discovers a new ailment, “There’s nothing good about getting old.”
After spending a month trying to read the newspaper and magazines under the brightest light in the house, I finally caved and bought a pair of reading glasses. Even so, I think my buddy Rocco has me beat.
Rocco said he woke up one day about five years ago and everything was blurry. After being scared for a few days, he finally went to the doctor and was diagnosed with a disease in a foreign language.
“What does that mean?” Rocco wondered.
“It means you’re 42.”
We were in the second row, just to the third base side of the screen for the first three innings before moving back about 20 rows for the remainder of the Thunder game. “Those were great seats, but they were too scary,” my friends explained.
I get their point. If you want to get out of the way of a foul ball quickly, it does help if you can see it.
Hey, “there’s nothing good about getting old.”
Actually, it was more relaxing set back from what was a sparse crowd. We probably chatted more about our families, jobs and past escapades than we watched the game.
About the fifth inning, Rocco got a little smile on his face and asked, “Kyle, what did you think of our next vice president’s speech last night?”
Charlie kind of leaned in to wonder, “Are we going there? Are we doing this again?”
Rocco smiled back to let him know that of course we were.
You see, I would be the lone Democrat of our group. You know, the guy, as they would say, that believes in taxing breath and giveaway programs.
As it turned out, I missed Sarah Palin’s speech. But, what the heck, I’m a sport.
“No, how was she, Rocco?”
“As brilliant as she is beautiful.”
Poor, Rocco. He finally gets his eyesight fixed and now his hearing starts to go.
Then it started.
I said Palin was too inexperienced and failed as an owner of a car wash. Rocco and Charlie saw her as a refreshing change and seemed to think Barack Obama couldn’t even get a car wash up and running in the first place.
I said after eight years of a failed presidency, it was only right that a Democrat took over. They seemed to believe history would be a lot kinder to Bush.
I said that Biden would be one of the most qualified vice presidents we ever had. They seemed to think he could have snap at any minute.
We couldn’t even agree on what to eat. I had chicken and fries; they had pork roll sandwiches.
You know, I have been asked on more than one occasion how we manage to get along, why I love these guys? You stop and think for a few minutes, because once we all got married, we saw less and less of each other.
But when we did get married, we were all there.
When one of us had a problem, we were there.
When my grandmother died, Charlie took off of work and just wanted to know where he should be and what he could do. He helped carry the casket. I’ll love him to the day I die for that.
When his mother and grandmother died, I was there and helped carry the casket. I consider it one of the most important things I have ever done in my life.
Hey, we’ll probably continue to have our political “debates” for years to come. I’ll still be a Democrat; they’ll still be Republicans. But the truth is after Nov. 4, it’s not going to matter that much. We’re all going to have to get along.
We might be going blind, but it’s not too hard for the three of us to see the things that are really important.

