2017-2021 Patellofemoral Arthritis

Knee problems. Continue reading

Background: I broke the patella (kneecap to you and me) of my right leg in 1974, the final year of my employment in Hartford. This event and its aftermath are described here. For twenty-four years the knee bothered me very little. When I got up from a chair I sometimes walked like Walter Brennan on The New McCoys1 for a few paces, but otherwise I managed quite well. I took up jogging in the following years. At one time I was able to run eighteen miles in a little more than three hours.

Chris Bessette.

In 1998 or 1999 something happened to my knee. I don’t remember injuring it, but it became quite swollen, and running produced a good bit of pain. I knew that Denise Bessette’s son Christopher had once had difficulty with his shoulder. She told me that Christopher2 was very happy with the outcome of the treatment by an orthopedic specialist who had an office in Enfield. I asked her for the physician’s name3 and made an appointment.

I told the doctor my symptoms, and I admitted that I was worried that he would advise me to give up running. He took x-rays and told me that he thought that the doctor who did the surgery on my knee had missed one of the fragments of the patella, and it had fused to a bone or something. He surprised me by asking me if my hip sometimes hurt. I said that it did, but I never suspected that it could be related.

He thought that my problem was tendinitis in the iliotibial (IT) band that connects the knee and hip on the outside of the knee. I later learned that IT band syndrome is rather common in distance runners. He gave me two prescriptions—one for pills to bring down the swelling and one for a few appointments with a physical therapist. It took a few weeks, but the pills worked.

I remember that the young lady who supervised my PT was very cute, but I don’t recall her name. The office that I went to was on the part of Route 5 that I often have driven past on the way to southbound I-91. It no longer is a clinic for physical therapists. At some point a podiatry clinic took over the building.

She taught me some exercises for strengthening the muscles around my knee and especially to stretch the IT band. What worked the best for me was one in which I held onto something with my right hand, stepped over my right foot with my left, thrust the hips to the left, and leaned a little to the right.

I performed the stretches before every time that I went for a run or, after I gave up running in 2008, a walk. I also used the step-over stretch when I felt a pain on the side of my knee or anywhere near my hip. This sometimes occurred when I rose and walked around after being in a sitting position for an extended period. As soon as I exited from an airplane I almost always did the step-over stretch before leaving the waiting area at the gate. It also came in handy for the European bus tours that Sue and I took in the twenty-first century. I probably looked silly, but that simple movement always decreased the pain and in most cases eliminated it.

Easter Sunday 2017: By 2017 my life had changed dramatically in many ways. TSI had been shut down for good for a few years. Sue and I had been on quite a few European vacations and one fantastic African safari trip to Tanzania (described here). I had established for myself an office in one of our spare bedrooms.

On Sunday morning, April 16, 2017, I was in my office working on the computer, probably on something related to bridge; by then I was both webmaster and database manager for the New England Bridge Conference. I arose from my chair to go to the bathroom. I got as far as the door to the office—about six feet—when my right leg gave out. I did not fall; I was able to grab the door frame to steady myself. I experienced a sharp pain in my knee, but it soon subsided.

The weather that Easter Sunday was quite nice. I was enthusiastic about the prospect of getting in a long walk around the neighborhood. In those days I made a circuit of about two miles walking on School St., Hazard Ave., Park St., and North St. I hoped to do two or three circuits that afternoon.

I was less than a quarter of a mile from the house when my leg gave out again. I fell flat on my face on the sidewalk. I got to my feet without difficulty and limped slowly and carefully back home. This seemed more serious than IT band syndrome.

I searched the Internet for information about dealing with knee pain. I learned about RICE: rest, icing, compression, and elevation. For the next month or two I stayed off of my leg as much as possible. I wore my knee brace and iced my knee after exercise. I brought a small chair into the office so that I could elevate it, and I put an ice pack on it until the swelling went down.

Even after the swelling subsided I did not feel comfortable about trying to walk several miles on it. It still felt very shaky. Eventually I decided to make an appointment at the Orthopedic Associates clinic in Glastonbury. I was amazed at the place. It was much larger than I anticipated. There were dozens of people—maybe a hundred—waiting to be seen. Most were older and much less ambulatory than I was. There was no way to tell how many patients were on the other side of the many reception desks.

They took x-rays of both knees, and then I met with Dr. Mark Shekhman, who specialized in hips and knees. He compared the x-rays of my two legs and showed me that there was much less cartilage in my right knee than in my left. He said that he thought my difficulties were due to arthritis, rather than either my fractured patella or the IT band syndrome.4 He prescribed more physical therapy, and told me that if I still had pain to call him. Injections could be used to address the problem.

I asked Dr. Shekhman if I could increase my mileage after I completed the therapy. I explained that I was getting fat. He assured me that I could.

The physical therapy that I received this time was overseen by two people at the Hartford Hospital office at 100 Hazard Ave. in Enfield. I don’t remember their names. I went once a week for five weeks in October and November. The prescription required me to attend twice per week, but the guy who worked with me the first week said that my problems were not that serious.

The staff there seemed to be better organized than the therapist with whom I had previously dealt. I usually started with an eight-minute warmup on a stationary bicycle. On the first visit the fellow who worked with me noticed that when I bent my leg I slanted my right knee in. He advised me to slant it out, as I already did with my left knee. He said that I had been favoring my left leg, and the muscles in my right leg needed strengthening. Both he and the female therapist also worked on getting the “knots” out of the muscles and ligaments surrounding the knee.

They also gave me exercises to perform every day. The list grew to include nine exercises, all of which were performed from a prone position. Three of them were stretches—four sets of holding the position for thirty seconds. These were basically prone versions of stretches that I had been doing since my first session in the nineties. The other seven were designed to build strength. They consisted of twenty repetitions of the designated movement.

After the second or third session I was provided with a paper that showed the exercises that I was to be doing. At the last session I was given a new paper that supposedly illustrated all of them. I saved both of these sheets of paper, although they were both badly wrinkled. I discovered recently that the second set only contained eight exercises, and one of those was shown twice. So, for the image shown above I created a composite that included all nine exercises.

I usually did these exercises before I went for a walk—either outside if the weather permitted or on my treadmill. I added one more exercise to stretch my calf muscles to reduce the likelihood of cramps. I found an old brown exercise or yoga mat in my garage. I laid it in the hallway, one of the few places in the house in which I could stretch my six-foot frame. It was a little tight, but I managed.

When I performed these exercises at the clinic I used two pieces of equipment. The first was similar to a dog’s leash. One end was looped around my foot. I grabbed the other end to pull my stiff leg toward my face. Then I pulled a straightened leg across the other leg to the side. The “leash” was also used it to pull a bent leg back to the rear, but I could just reach back and grab my foot for that one. I have good flexibility in that respect. At home I repurposed an old Donald Duck tie as a substitute for the “leash”.

The second instrument was a length of stretchy fabric that had been knotted into a loop. This one was used for the “clamshell” exercise depicted on the sheet, and they let me keep it. After a month or so it snapped in two; I did not replace it.

The left one: I exercised my right leg using this routine nearly every day for almost two years. I felt pretty good about the progress that I had been making until the day on which my left leg almost collapsed while I was walking on School St. I limped back to the house. By the next day the left knee was swollen. I used what I had learned with my right leg to try to address it. Eventually the swelling went away, but the pain still occurred occasionally.

I expanded my exercises to include both legs. I revised the order so that I did not need to change positions so often. I started on my back with the straight leg raise—right and then left—and the bridging. I then did the three exercises lying on my right side followed by the two that required me to be face down—left and then right.

Next I did the three exercises while lying on my left side. I then rolled over to my back again and attached the tie to my right foot for the stretch that pulls the leg back and the ITB stretch. I then transferred the tie to my left foot and did the same two stretches. I finished with the calf stretch that is not shown on the sheet. The whole set took about half an hour.

My left leg was still bothering me when I attended the fall North American Bridge Championships in San Francisco (described here). Quite a bit of walking was required there. It felt very strange to be limping on a different leg. I did my exercises on most mornings, but I was still uncomfortable most of the time that I was there. My right leg did not bother me at all.

Recovery: By the time of the worldwide shutdown due to the pandemic my left leg had fully recovered. Over the spring and summer of 2020 I walked at least five mile nearly every day. On several days I did 7½ miles and at least twice I walked ten miles. I almost never had any pain in my legs. The most likely location of discomfort was in my right lower back. However, I was usually able to stretch this away.

I often rested on the cast-iron bench in front of Dr. Cummiskey’s office.

Over the fall and winter I walked on the treadmill5 more often than outside. A new development was a pain on the top of my right foot that spread to the ankle. At first it only occurred when I walked outside. Later a much milder version plagued me on the treadmill as well. I could usually walk for about 1¼ miles before it became difficult to tolerate. After I rested for a couple of minutes and stretched the leg, it went away. However, it usually came back after about the same distance.

We were scheduled to take a European river cruse in October of 2021. My goal was to be able to participate in all of the excursions without leg pain. Since we decided to postpone this cruise until May of 2022, whether I can achieve that still remains to be determined.


1. If you are unfamiliar with Grandpappy Amos’s gait, you can view a short demonstration here.

2. Christopher Bessette’s LinkedIn page is here.

3. I can picture the doctor in my imagination, but I have forgotten his name.

4. In retrospect, I am sure that Dr. Shekhman was correct in his diagnosis of arthritis. However, I think that he was a little too dismissive of my two previous experiences. It was likely that the arthritis was precipitated by the original fracture. Also, the IT band syndrome never really went away. I had rather mild symptoms both before and after the arthritis treatments. Aside from that first day when I fell I never really had much pain in my knee itself.

5. The biggest problem with the treadmill was boredom. I subscribed to the Metropolitan Opera On Demand service for about a year. I streamed operas on my Lenovo convertible PC (which is called Yoga) and watched them while I was walking. I also watched some operas and the entire series Inspector Morse shows on YouTube. Later I subscribed to MHz Choice and watched a large number of European mysteries with subtitles. February 10, 2021, was a very dark day for me. The treadmill broke. Since then I have used the rowing machine when I could not walk. On May 26 I dropped my Big Bubba mug on Yoga and cracked the screen badly. I bought a new Microsoft laptop from Best Buy a few days later.

1972-1974 Connecticut: Sports

Athletic activities in the Hartford area: basketball, golf, etc. Continue reading

Swimming: The apartment building in which I lived in East Hartford had an outdoor swimming pool. I brought a bathing suit with me to Connecticut, and I spent some pleasurable hours sitting next to the pool. I may have also entered the water for short periods once or twice.

Basketball: Tom Herget and Tom Corcoran had discovered that pickup basketball games were often held on the asphalt court near Batchelder School. After I had been working for a week or so, they invited me to join them. At first I demurred, but Herget was very good at shaming people into joining the fun. A bunch of us played there on a regular basis.

Batchelder School still exists, but the basketball court seems to be gone.

It was a good court. We played a full-court game without a ref. The court was neither as long nor as wide as a regulation court, but it was quite adequate for a three-on-three or four-on-four game. The rims were regulation-height and quite sturdy.

Sometimes so many guys were there that we had two one-basket games. As often as we could, we played full-court.

Guys would come and go. The teams were fluid. I think that we kept score, but no one cared who won. There were arguments about fouls, of course, but I can’t remember anyone getting upset enough to do anything about it.

I can’t remember the names of any of the players except for people from the Hartford. Here are my most vivid recollections:

  • A guy who played with us all the time had a unique shot. He was only 5’8″ or so, and he was not very mobile. If he got open, however, he would quickly bring the ball up over his head and launch a shot with virtually no arc that just cleared the front of the rim. When the ball made contact with the back of the rim it almost always dove straight down into the net. This was due to the fact that he somehow imparted an enormous amount of backspin to his shot. I was a great admirer of his shot; my attempts to emulate it were failures.
  • Herget also had a devilish shot. He liked to drive right into an opponent’s chest and then scoop the ball underhand toward the basket behind the opponent’s back. He beat me with this maneuver many times even after Tom Corcoran showed me how to defend it—by keeping one’s own arms down and once he started the scoop just placing the hand on that side on top of the ball. Herget usually passed the ball away if Corcoran was guarding him.
  • A couple of times an Emergency Medical Technician played with us a few times while he was on duty. He parked his vehicle near the court and left the radio on. I don’t think that he ever got any calls while he was playing. I wonder what he would have been doing if he wasn’t playing with us.
  • I remember one magical day in 1974 when, for some strange reason, I could do no wrong on the court. On most days I missed three or four shots for every one that I made, but on the magical day my shooting percentage was certainly in the eighties or nineties. I got several rebounds and made some good defensive plays, too. It never happened again.
  • Several times opponents—to their regret—brushed up against my very sharp elbows or knees. Once a guy’s thigh hit my knee harder than usual. I barely felt it, but he stopped playing and, as I recall, just limped to his car and drove home.
  • One day in late May or June of 1974 we were playing a full-court game. I had the ball, and I was running at a good speed and dribbling while looking for an open teammate. Somehow I slipped or tripped and fell forward. I landed on the heels of my hand, but the top of my right knee hit the pavement about as hard as one might knock on a door. I cried out in pain, but when I rolled up the leg of my pants to unveil a small scratch, I was ridiculed by the other guys for stopping the game. I played for a few more minutes, but then my knee gave out, and I limped to Greenie and drove home. That was my last game at Batchelder.

On the way home I had to stop to buy something for supper, cauliflower I think. By the time that I reached the apartment in Andover in which I was living my knee was so swollen that it looked like a cantaloupe was stuffed in my jeans. Sue Comparetto somehow brought me to a doctor whose name I don’t remember. He took X-rays and determined that my patella (kneecap to you) had broken into several pieces. The largest one could stay, but the others needed to be surgically removed.

Hospital

An ambulance took me to the Windham Community Memorial Hospital in Willimantic. I was assigned to a room with three older men, all of whom were there for hernia operations. One at a time, they each went to the OR before I did. The scenes were similar. The anesthetic was administered. The patient counted backward from 100. The first two were out buy 97. The third guy, however, was down into the seventies when they told him he could stop. I am not sure how they ever knocked him out. Maybe they just gave him something to stick between his teeth.

I, who have a mortal dread of needles, was much more apprehensive about the injection of the anesthetic than of the carving of my leg. They gave me the shot, and the next thing that I knew was that I was back in the room with a cast on my leg. The surgeon came to see me a little later. He asked me to lift the leg. I couldn’t do it. He said that I could not leave until I could lift it by myself.

In the day or two it took me to find those muscles again I had a few visitors. I am sure that Sue came. So did Jim and Ann Cochran.

I had a view of downtown Willy from my bed. I could either see a sign for Kentucky Fried Chicken of one of the colonel’s stores. In either case it gave me a strong incentive to raise my leg. I really wanted some fried chicken. I was released before any of the hernia guys.

My injury had a good side and a bad side. The benefit was immediate. I had been called up for summer camp by the Army Reserve. I called the phone number on the notice to report that I had broken my kneecap and could not come. The guy who answered—I took down his name, but I don’t remember it—assured me that I did not need to come. Since 1974 was the last year that I was eligible, I never had to atten reserve camp. I was not dreading the duty, but I did not want to return to work at the Hartford with a military haircut.

The bad side was that the surgeon missed one small piece of bone, and it eventually adhered to my femur. It did not bother me much for twenty-five years, but in 1999 I was diagnosed with tendinitis of the IT band. The doctor attributed it to that tiny piece of my patella. Some stretching exercises made the condition manageable, but in 2017 I got arthritis in that knee. This in turn has made it more difficult to keep the IT band from bunching up. I am not complaining. I have averaged walking five miles per day in the ten months starting in March of 2020, but I need to do a lot more stretching.


Golf: I started playing golf with John Sigler late in the summer of 1972. We played together every chance that we got, and we tried nearly every public course in the area. He was better than I was at every aspect of the game, but I enjoyed our outings together immensely. In 1973 we even took off many Wednesdays during the summer to play golf.

TPC

On one of those days in the summer of 1973 we drove down to Cromwell to play the Edgewood Golf Club. The layout was later redone to suit the pros, and the name was changed to TPC River Highlands. It was the most difficult course that I had ever played then, and they made it much tougher when they made it a Tournament Players Championship course in the eighties.

Aerial view of Black Birch Golf Club.
Aerial view of Black Birch Golf Club.

In 1973 John and I also played together at the annual outing of the Actuarial Club of Hartford in Moodus, CT. I did not remember the name of the course, but the only one in Moodus seems to be Black Birch Golf Club. It was a miserable day for golf—or anything else. The rain started halfway through our round, and it was also very windy. I seem to remember that John played well enough to win a dozen Titleists. I think that I won three Club Specials as a kind of booby prize. The highlight of the round for me was watching Mike Swiecicki ride merrily around in a cart and swatting at his ball with little care about the results. I also enjoyed playing bridge with John and a cigar-smoking Tom Corcoran. I don’t remember who was our fourth.

At some point John and I added Norm Newfield and Bill Mustard to our golfing group. Norm, who was a star quarterback and pitcher at Central Connecticut and the Navy1, worked in the Personnel Department. I think that Bill worked in the IT Department. Norm was a big hitter, and Bill was an absolute beast, but neither of them could control the ball’s flight like John could. I was definitely the wimp in this foursome. Most of the time we played at Tallwood in Hebron.

Minn

In 1974 John and I signed up to play in the Hartford’s golf league. The nine-hole matches were on Fridays at Minnechaug Golf Course in Glastonbury. I have always been better at team sports than individual ones, and it proved true again. Of course, John always played against the opponent’s better player. Still, we played seven or eight matches, and I tied won and won the rest. We were in first place in the league with only one or two matches remaining when I broke my kneecap. Our proudest achievement was defeating Norm and his partner, whose name was, I think, Bill Something. He probably worked in HR with Norm.

I remember one match pretty clearly. We were playing against two guys whom we did not know at all. I think that I had to give up six strokes, and John had to give up seven in only nine holes. John’s opponent had a new set of really nice-looking clubs. My opponent was from India, or at least his parents were. When I told this story to friends I usually called him “The Perfect Master”. We were afraid of a setup. Because of the handicap differentials, if they played at all well, we would have no chance.

On the first tee John’s opponent exhibited a monstrous slice, but the ball stayed in play. My opponent then hit the shortest drive I have ever seen. He did not whiff, but the impact was much less than Lou Aiello’s swinging bunt (described here). The ball stayed in the tee box less than a foot in front of his left shoe.

Minn8

Neither John nor I could take the match seriously after that. We both played worse than we would have thought possible. Going into the eighth hole, the match was in serious jeopardy. However, the eighth, a short island hole, was always good to us. We both put our iron shots on the green. The opponents both plunked their tee shots into the water. The last hole cinched all three points for us when both of our opponents found the water again. We survived our worst match ever and, of course, enjoyed a beer afterwards.

Jim Cochran stepped in to take my place for the last few matches. Alas, John and Jim lost the championship match.

Buena Vista's swank clubhouse.
Buena Vista’s swank clubhouse.

There was one other interesting golf adventure. Tom Herget arranged for John, Tom Corcoran, and I to join him for nine holes at the Buena Vista Golf Course in West Hartford. Par for this course is only 31 or 32. It is much easier than Minnechaug.

Herget evidently wanted to try out the golf clubs that he had purchased (or perhaps found in an alley) somewhere. They were at least six inches too short for him, and he is not tall. When he went to hit the ball, his hands were at knee level. Danny Devito is too tall for these clubs.

The round itself produced few memories. I do not remember the scores, but I do remember that Sigler shot in the thirties, I scored in the forties, Corcoran in the fifties, and Herget in the sixties.

Baseball/Softball: I remember that several of us drove up to Fenway for a game between the Red Sox and the Yankees. Somehow we got box seats in the upper deck right even with third base. I have been to games in four or five stadiums. This was by far my best experience. I remember eating peanuts, drinking beer, and yelling at the players and coaches. We were unbelievably close to them. It was more intimate than a Little League game.

Dick Howser was third base coach for the Yankees for ten years!
Dick Howser was third base coach for the Yankees for ten years!

I channeled my inner Bob Anderson to loudly rebuke New York’s third-base coach, Dick Howser2, for mistakenly waving a runner home. He actually looked up at us. I remembered him as a so-so shortstop (after his promising rookie season) for the KC A’s. He had a goofy batting stance with his legs spread wide and his head about four feet off the ground.

I later felt a little guilty about my boorish conduct at Fenway when he became the Royals’ manager and in 1985 guided them to the my home town’s only World Series win. One must understand that people who grew up in KC in the fifties and sixties REALLY hate the Yankees.

I remember going to watch Patti Lewonczyk play softball a couple of times. I do not recall whether the Hartford had a team in a city-wide league or an entire league of teams like the men’s. Patti was a good hitter, and she did not throw like a girl. I am pretty sure that Sue took photos on at least one occasion, but I don’t know where they are, and I dasn’t ask.

Schaefer

Football: On September 23, 1973, a group of us went to a football game between the Patriots and the Chiefs at Schaefer3 Stadium in Foxborough. I could not believe what a dump the place was. I don’t remember any details. The game was a real snoozer. The Chiefs held the Pats to only one touchdown, but they only scored ten points themselves, which was enough for a W. After that one magic season in 1969-70, the Chiefs quickly became an also-ran team for the next five decades!

I also attended several college games. The most entertaining one was on October 20, 1973. I rode to Providence in Tom Corcora’s Volkswagen for the game between Brown and Dartmouth. Dartmouth entered the game with an 0-3 record, but they beat the Bears 28-16. The Big Green went on to win all the rest of their its (their?) games that year. Brown finished 4-3-1, which was very good for Brown teams of that era.

I guess you could see the band’s formations from the Brown side. We were in the visitor’s bleachers.

The game was fairly interesting. There were no NFL prospects, but the Ivy League schools were famous for their trick plays. That is my kind of football.

Even more interesting was the rascally atmosphere that shocking for a deadly serious Michigan fan to experience. For example, one guy in the stands had brought a keg of beer as a date. The keg was wearing a dress and a blonde wig. This would never happen at Michigan Stadium. Alcohol was strictly forbidden at the games, and seats were precious possessions; nobody got two.

Dartmouth had never had an official mascot, but for decades most people called them the Indians. In 1972 the Alumni Association advised against this in favor of another nickname, the Big Green. The teams embraced this, but a set of alternate cheerleaders attended this game. They sat in the stands and wore identity-concealing costumes. One was a gorilla; I don’t remember the others, but none were Indians. Whenever the official cheerleaders finished a cheer for the Big Green, the alt-leaders rushed to the sidelines to lead the same cheer for the Indians. This went on without objection. It did not seem strange to anyone but me.

They wore turtlenecks when we saw them.

The Brown band played at halftime. Their uniforms were brown turtlenecks. Most people wore nondescript pants, but several had evidently played for the soccer or rugby team that morning. Their legs were muddy, and they wore shorts. A few of them also had comical hats.

The band formed itself into various formations, but our seats were too low to make sense of them. The stadium was not big. I doubt that many people could decipher them. The band members just ran to their spots for each formation. They did not march in the orderly fashion that I was used to. I think that the primary purpose of the entertainment was to make fun of Dartmouth.

This is the only picture I could find of Eric Torkelson in a UConn uniform.
This is the only picture I could find of Eric Torkelson in a UConn uniform.

The very next Saturday I drove to Storrs by myself to watch a game between UMass and UConn. Both at the time were 1AA schools and members of the Yankee Conference. I did not know exactly where the stadium was. I expect to see crowds of people walking toward the stadium. After all, this was their rivalry game. UMass had won last year, but UConn had a pretty good team in 1973. The star, as I remember, was fullback Eric Torkelson4. The conference championship was on the line. The weather was beautiful.

In fact, however, two-thirds of the seat were empty. Very few students showed up. The closest people to me were a guy and his young son. UConn won 28-7 and won the conference championship.

I also tried to play a little flag football. I bought some cleats at G. Fox in downtown Hartford. Norm Newfield was on a team in New Britain. Tom Herget and I went to their tryouts. I played pretty well; I caught every pass that I got a hand on. However, they were looking for blockers and rushers, and I did not fit their plans. Tom did.

I went to several of their games. Once I ended up sitting with Mel, Tom’s girlfriend at the time. I soon discovered that she knew surprising little about football. I explained about the first-down yardage markers and what Tom’s role was on every play. I was just mansplaining, but she seemed to appreciate it.

I played in one pickup game with Tom and some of his acquaintances. It might have been on a field near Batchelder School. Because no one could guard me when I wore my cleats, I had to take them off and play in sneakers.

I watched college football on television every Saturday. In those days I could even bear to watch when Michigan was playing. Jan Pollnow invited me over to his house to watch the Wolverines one Saturday. Michigan won easily. The Big Ten was then better known as the Big Two and the Little Eight.

I felt a little uneasy at his house, as I did the time in Romulus, NY, when the lieutenant in the Intelligence Office had me over for dinner.

Tennis: I brought my tennis racket with me from KC, and I actually played one game of tennis. It was on Saturday, August 18, 1973. My opponent was Jim Kreidler. I was “under the weather” from overindulgence on my twenty-fifth birthday the night before. Nevertheless, I was ahead in the match by a game or two when Jim twisted his ankle.

See? People do this.
See? People do this.

He wanted to quit. I argued that we should continue the match. I would not require him to stand on his ankle. He could just sit there and wave at the ball with his racket. I would retrieve all the shots on both sides of the net. We could probably finish in a half hour or less.

He stubbornly refused this most generous offer. So, I fear that I must report that I have never actually won a tennis match.

In New England there are three types of bowling.

Bowling: At least once I went duckpin bowling with Tom Corcoran and Patti Lewonczyk. It does not feel at all like tenpin bowling, and I have no idea what it takes to be a good duckpin bowler. It seemed like you just grabbed any old ball and let it fly.

On TV I also watched candlepin bowling from Springfield. In this version you get three shots, not two, and they do not sweep away the toppled pins until the third ball has been rolled. So, you can use your “wood” to help pick up spares. I never tried this version.


1. Norm is in CCSU’s Hall of Fame. His page is here. In 2021 his FaceBook page says that he lives in Winsted, CT.

2. Dick Howser died in 1987 of a brain tumor only two years after managing the World Series winners and one year after managing the winners of the All-Star game.

3. Schaefer was a popular beer in the northeast in the seventies. Its slogan was “Schaefer is the one beer to have if you’re having more than one.” No one that I knew liked it. We reformulated it to “Schaefer is the one beer to have if you’ve alreadh had more than one.”

4. Torkelson, although not drafted until the eleventh round, played seven seasons for the Green Bay Packers.