Afternoon blog. BAM! Change in routine.
I'll be discussing sandwiches and greatness today. In no particular order...
At what point does something cross the defining line from good to great? When does a good tennis match between an unknown Frenchman and a towering 6'9" yank flirt with greatness? Is there a tangible measurement? For John Isner and Nicholas Mahut, the records they rewrote these last few days are laughable. Over 11 hours for one tennis match to finish. Over 200 aces combined for both players. 3 days to complete all 5 sets. But what made this tennis match great was the battle. I watched from 27-27 on, and greatness flowed through both players in their resilience. They didn't know the stats. They didn't care. They just knew that for the next few minutes, they needed to win THAT game. One serve, one return, and one fuzzy little ball at a time. And neither player backed down from the challenge. Physical and mental exhaustion were non-existent. Greatness. Someday I hope I can experience putting 7 straight hours of complete devotion into something like they both did on Day 2 and see the result.
Jumping continents, I think about greatness in Landon Donovan's goal in the 91st minute of the World Cup game yesterday morning. In the moment, just like Donovan said, the goal was easy. Any soccer player at most levels would agree that a goal from 7 yards out directly in front of the net with the goalie sprawled on the ground is pretty much a gimmie. But the greatness of the goal came in the moment. It was what would ensue if the US didn't score. Another 4 years of misery, frustration, disappointment, and loss of faith from the US fans loomed. The 20 or so seconds from when the ball flew magnificently from Tim Howard's gloves to Donovan's sprinting spikes to Altidore's efficient finesse to Dempsey's fortunate goalie deflection to Donovan's golden strike, Facebook statuses, Twitter updates, and headlines everywhere changed forever. Unimaginable hours of training and sacrifices over decades of training from Landon Donovan brought him to a place where an event as trivial as swinging his leg to kick a ball into a coveted section of grass and nylon made him forever a candidate for greatness.
We all experience glimpses of greatness, no matter what level of celebrity they receive. We can either let the moments write our story, or we can write the stories in the moment. This is the part where it would be dramatic and emphatic for me to ask, "What will you choose?" but instead, I'll just leave you with this...
Sandwiches are great.
יש לך מגבות נייר
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