He is mid-eighties, with white, floppy hair. And he’s from Western Pennsylvania. We met last night.
He was one of twenty fresh faces at my friend Dennis’ birthday dinner.
Seated at the 40 yard line of a long rectangular table (high school cafeteria style), we were surrounded by the warmth of someone else’s family.
So how do you people from Cleveland break the ice with a sea of Pittsburghers?
“Bruce knows everything about the Pirates from the good old days!”, Dennis bragged to his brothers.
“Well, not really. You know, Mazeroski to Stargell, those days..”
Then they tried to one-up me.
“Doesn’t’ he look exactly like Paterno?” they exclaimed, pointing in unison at the man down by the ten.
“Uncle Steve, “ he said extending his hand.
For the next hour or so the men at the table connected through the universal language of sports, from Steelers to Browns to Ohio State to Penn State to….
“Did you know I’ve never driven a car?”, Uncle Steve interrupted.
And with that the sports talk stopped on a dime. This was a story I needed to hear. And I did.
“Let me get this straight…you NEVER drove a car?”
And so I came to learn that Uncle Steve lost one eye at age eight when the truck backfired, that he walked to work and back his entire life, that he never married.
“What do you do all day?” (I had to know)… He seemed too active a soul to be housebound.
With a smile, he explained to me he walks to breakfast daily, that some of his friends drive, but he prefers to walk. That, did I know he’d been a halfback in the military? Or that his nickname back then was “Greased Lightning?” And that twice a week he takes a bus down to Wheeling, West Virginia, to play the ponies.
His face glowed. Indeed, he is the softer, gentler Joe Paterno.
“Uncle Steve, “didn’t you ever want to drive?, I asked. Again, I had to know.
He looked me dead in the eye with his answer: “Why would I?”