By Scott Sullivan
Editor
The Real Way
Late Friday, Oct. 13, was no time to venture far from the Three Rivers Super 8. Carter and I had an early next a.m. video gig for which squalls were announcing themselves already.
In asphalt lot cracks we saw strip mall shop lights reflecting, but none for Subway. “Trust me, we can walk there,” I told him.”
I didn’t say I’d scouted Three Rivers after checking in at 4ish, asked the clerk for a restaurants guide.
“I make you a copy.”
Arby’s, Big King Buffet, Biggby Coffee, Hank’s on the River, three Subways, Kelsey Block Brewing … What’s that? I asked.
“Brewery? I don’t know town well. Here.” She marked an X beside and underlined El Camino Real. “I like that one.”
Thanks, I said and set out to get lost, pretext for seeking figments of a craft brewery. Drawing fresh from Lower Peninsula watersheds, it would sit on the spot the St. Joseph River splits into Rocky and Portage tributaries from the north.
The St. Joe would dip south through Constantine and South Bend-Mishawaka-Elkhart, Ind., then north again near Notre Dame to recross the state line where Muhammad Ali’s last home lies.
“The Champ” lived simply as “The Greatest of All Time” could on his 81-acre Rope-a-Dopes estate in Berrien Springs with, to your right, a mile of river frontage. Picture him finding peace away from it, in middle of his private boxing ring.
Ali owned the farm from 1975 till his death, from Parkinson’s complications, in 2016, spending summers and vacations there. His widow sold it for $2.5 million in 2019, down from $2,985,037 (the last digits a reference to his 37 career knockouts) she first asked the prior year.
From there it heads northwest and out to empty in Lake Michigan at the Benton Harbor-St. Joseph pierhead. Many lovers’ vows here become cemented, framed by catwalk arbors, past red, white and black lighthouses.
As I drove down Three Rivers dead ends and back, lights came on in ravine-top houses but no brewery appeared. Must have been Friday the 13th witchcraft.
Former standup comic turned Eastern Michigan University dean Art McCafferty, joined pedagog peers launching Great Lakes Sports Publications, including Michigan Runner, in 1979. Carter was lead photographer.
I’d started running races in 1993 urged on at age 38 by my soon to be fiancee.
Subway’s prices were up since I’d been there last, but whose haven’t? Three Rivers Store #3 had standard steel trays meant to be stuffed with pre-sliced cheeses, meats, greens … Wheat, Italian herbs & cheese, and white breads sample footlongs shone under clear plastic shelved containers …
Back to Genesis 6.11, I told Carter, the missing link to Matthew is that testaments, like gospels, do concur, one just coming later.
“How?”
God punishes mortal flesh he’s created. Take Adam, expelled with Eve from Eden for tasting forbidden fruit. So why did the sadist put it there in the first place?
Flooded Noah, did in Lot, tried Job’s faith with boils, loss of 10 children, all his money, pride, prestige just to win a bet with Satan, then restores them. How’s it new, then he hangs up one more at least half-mortal son to dry?
“Sun’s supposed to come out after our shoot,” Carter said. “When we’re driving home, listening to the Indiana at Michigan football game.”
Ourselves dry as a bone, no doubt, I agreed. So bear witness in our allotted times with cameras.What length Canon 1DX-Mark 2 body lenses you figure to use?
“Was that a footlong Roast Beef?” asked the waitress.
Please, I said. Hold the pepper, onions, tomatoes …
“12-inch Subway Melt for me, with everything,” Carter said.
Lights came on for me running races. I’d hang out in early shoe stores, eyeballing colorful racks on walls, eager to learn from other runners so fixated.
Some also carried socks, shorts, singlets, weather jackets, corner displays of race entry forms and Michigan Runner magazines. Hmm, I thought.
PING! The microwave hum stopped; our feasts were ready. I unwrapped my still- steaming Roast Beef, picked off pickles and played aloud with possible headlines to frame tomorrow. How about this? I asked Carter.
Heavens open on Lawless as Gunn-fired harriers assail 83-acre wood.
“Makes people who pay for this pleasure sound like termites, he observed. “Also, Ron Gunn starts charges crying ‘Fire up.’
The more words, the smaller font you must use on headlines, unless you deck them … What about staying dry?
“Drone’s out,” he said, glancing over me out the window dotted with condensation. “So monopod to shoot video, maybe stills too. Both cams mount on a universal plate.”
Did you know you can buy two Formica tables and four chairs like we’re sitting at for less than $30 when a franchise liquidates? I said idly.
MR founding editor Dave Foley took me on as a free-lancer back then, got hurt running near his home in Cadillac, stepped down because he couldn’t run any longer, and Art handed off what Dave did to Jennie.
She and Art shortly made me managing editor, then editor on proving I couldn’t manage. How desperate could they be?