Mr. Rogers, Performance Enhancing Drugs and Accepting Overheard Praise

If you have a few moments, watch, enjoy and be deeply touched by Fred Rodgers aka Mr. Rodgers from 1969 as he appeared before the United States Senate Subcommittee on Communications. His goal was to support funding for PBS and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, in response to significant proposed cuts by President Nixon.I grew up with this man teaching us to accept and love all people, to me he is one of many of our national treasures.

This past week we heard about two sports figures using drugs. One recreational and one as a performance enhancing drug. I am of course talking about Alex Rodriguez and Michael Phelps. They are two completely different types of stories and both speak volumes about the individuals.

I got my chops busted by Chris Jagger, a friend and local radio deejay for A-Rod "bashing". I did not mean so much to bash him - I just get so tired of sports figures being referred to as "heros". Some are great men, some do great things, but they play sports - hardly in my book a hero. Baseball is not exclusive to cheating, lying and deception. It goes for all professional sports. Sports of any kind is a game, and (some) people cheat at games.

Being an ex pro athlete I personally am all for taking anything you can to enhance your performance. I think you should push yourself to the absolute limit and see what you can achieve. GO FOR IT, JUST DO IT, etc.. Talk about exciting! Even in the Olympics, lets see exactly what the human body can do. However, there are rules that ban this sort of behavior while participating in your chosen sport.

I could branch off into A-Rod did something that was banned at his work place, during work, while Michael did something completely outside of his sport that has nothing to do with his sporting event performance or the integrity of his gold medals. But for now I am going to skip these topics and get to the beef of what irks me.

What the issue is for me (and I only speak for myself) I can sum up in two words; blow job. Did I think President Clinton getting a blow job from Monica in the oval office was a big deal, no. What gets under my skin is when anyone looks misty eyed directly into a camera and denies what they have done. A-Rod did this and is an idiot. If you are going to be asked a hard question and are going to lie about the answer making a public idiot of yourself, avoid the interview. Tell Matt Lauer you're going to sleep in and not be able to make the TODAY show, or you have a pedicure planned, but don't go knowing they are going to ask, knowing you're going to lie and knowing you are going to be found out as a fraud. Best of all, do not do anything that will comprimise your public honor and dignity.

It's called integrity, most of us learned it by age 4 watching Mr. Rodgers.

So, in class the other day we did an exercise entitled "Overheard Praise". Under any circumstances it would have been interesting, but what gave it an added twist was that we are relatively new and don't really know each other at all. I have said hello to one or two ladies that I have in other classes, but that is about it.

Let me quickly add, that I do adore and dig the ladies in my group (we call ourselves The Achievers) so that made the exercise easier and was a great ice breaker for us to get to know each other a little better.

My experience as being the one in the hot seat, accepting praise, was pleasant. It is always nice to hear a total stranger say something positive about you. Lakisha, who is in my Algebra class, said I was good in Algebra. That was nice recognition and felt very sincere. Others also said I was confident and a gentleman, also seemingly sincere and enjoyable to hear. Other things mentioned were about my hair and my style of dress (what style??) just seemed like filler, pleasant but generic things to say about someone you really don't know.

I don't want to take away from anything anyone said, it was nice, but nothing blew me away. I have had years of skating shows I was featured in reviewed, both good and bad. I get about as excited as someone saying something positive as I get disappointed when someone says something negative. I am very middle of the road when it comes to others opinions. We all have them and just the nature of "opinion" conveys that there is no right or wrong.

Learning from being in the hot seat first, I didn't want to be guilty of saying something that I considered filler, so I tried to be as real as possible. I did find myself embarrassed when I mentioned one of the girls was really beautiful and not the others. I even tried to stay away from anything about ones physical being. I said I did not know why, but I feel Monique was very smart; and with nothing to back it up other than her talking proudly about her beautiful baby, I said I felt like Lakisha was a loving mother.

Bottom line, the 5 of us got to know each other, giggled, talked and bonded a little. Now when we see each other in the halls or on the street we wave and greet each other. Several of us traded phone numbers. It was a great positive experience (much like your class).

One last thought (I'm sorry I ramble so much, I write for several publications and never have a shortage of something to say), two classes ago (per your suggestion during our first class) I moved to the other side of the room to sit during class. It is an interesting observation to me that no one else has done this. We humans find a "space" that is comfortable and do not want to go outside that space (space being a physical place or a mental place). Since I was young I have always been pushed out of that "space" by parents, coaches and managers to find other spaces, some better, some worse - but all had something to teach me. I am glad I moved to the other side of your class room because I got to meet 5 wonderful women.

Drink more coffee.