6. The Athlete In The Real World: Dealing With The Cost of Living
April 8, 1971. The athlete at Harvard is not sheltered from the real world. He (or she) too must face the cold, sometimes bitter realities of life. And so it was today when I discovered that the price of a Cheeseburg Special at Charlie's Kitchen was now $1.75. No undergraduate at Harvard today remembers the days when said special was 99 cents...and that included a beer. On many occasions while discussing why Harvard is reluctant to admit average athletes with varsity aspirations. Jack Reardon, athletic director and former associate admissions dean, has said. "We don't want a situation where a kid doesn't make the varsity and he spends four years drinking at Charlie's Kitchen." It seems logical to conclude that the University must be ecstatic with those of us who made the varsity and spent four years drinking at Charlie's Kitchen.
7. The Athlete, The Media, and The Public
February 1972. A varsity athlete at Harvard must face the music. Not a professional, still the Harvard athlete is in the limelight and people and the media will be demanding. So this athlete learned when the hockey team for which he tended goal lost four straight games. I thought it had peaked after a Beanpot loss to B.U. when The Crimson compared my glove hand to that of Marv Throneberry. But the meaning of the term "humbled" was never clearer than on that Saturday afternoon in Ithaca when a lone voice in Cornell's Lynah Rink intoned, "Bertagna, you're not a sieve...you're a funnel!"
8. Leaving Harvard
June 11, 1973. Today I graduated from Harvard University. As my parents watched with pride, Prof. Alan Heimert, Master of Eliot House, presented my diploma and shook my hand, acknowledging my existence for the first time in three years. Amazing what the proper audience can do. If the athlete thinks that graduation means the end of games, wait until he tries to get a job on the outside. That's where the real games begin.
9. The Athlete As Alumnus
1973--.You say that all that school spirit and pride is nothing but a crock. You don't go for that rah-rah stuff. You're above that. But when Yale wins The Game, the tailgating is not as good. And when you go to a cocktail party and someone is raving about B.U.'s hockey program, your stomach starts to turn. And, God, when Ed King beats The Duke and the man stands up there before all of us singing "For Boston," it's enough to make one vomit. You can take the boy out of the arena but....
10. The Athlete as Coach
1977-78. Ten years ago he struggles to fill out the application for admission to Harvard College. Now he is sending notes to the Admissions Office about a woman ice hockey player he is trying to recruit for the team he coaches. The athlete finds that he has picked up many habits of those who coached him. The style, the techniques, the sayings. And he finds he does the same things he said he'd never do if he were coach. And he finds that the players have plenty to say about him just as he had to say about his coaches. And he finds that ten years later, nothing has really changed. Lunch at Elsie's, dinner at Charlie's, win the game and go to bed.