First in a series. Possibly. Depending. Upon your response. A series where I introduce you to the most loyal PressingPausers. The peeps who read regularly and respond sporadically, in Z’s case almost always behind the scenes using something known as electronic mail. Or actually, snail mail half the time.

Z was a mentor, friend, lunch bball brother back in the day when I taught at Guilford College in Greensboro, NC. Is still a dear friend, despite living on the wrong side of the country. A now retired psychology professor whose wheelhouse was really social psychology, and even more specifically, the power elite. He was the rare small liberal arts college professor who managed to maintain a large university-like research agenda, pumping out articles and books on men and women he followed over decades from their admission to the “A Better Chance” program into the uppermost levels of business, government, law, and other professions. Lucid, imminently interesting, substantive stuff.

And he’s also The Commissioner. The guy who holds the M-W-F noon basketball game together, now I think half a century old, through court closures, pandemics, and Father Time. He published a great book on that part of his life too. When angry and much larger Joe Groves didn’t like my defense and/or my committee’s general education curriculum revision proposal, Z would reign Joe in with a look or quick comment in the locker room. Everyone always respected The Commissioner. Even angry Joe Groves.

Today, by chance, this was on the doorstep. Sent by Z.

I can’t believe how lucky I am to have a friend who still thinks about me almost twenty five years since I padded his assist totals with my silky J.

Z or I sent the other a winning t-shirt every April depending on how the NCAA tournament played out, I took a handful of west coast teams, he took an equivalent number of east coast ones, but conference craziness fecked all of that up, so now it’s the occasional book. Like with too many of my friends, I need to pick up the slack. Note to self. Find a book, send it.

Z, like me, really dug his students. He also loves his border collies and L, a wonderful pottery artist.

Ironically, I just bought something in his parts, Wilmington, NC more specifically, that I can’t tell Z anything about. Interesting things about Wilmington, NC, it’s where Michael Jordan grew up and where I competed in my first triathlon. Threw my back out the day before, didn’t know if I could go, but got through the intracoastal waterway swim feeling okayish. Then the out-n-back 40k flat/windy bike. I could swear it was a side wind! At the turn around I learned it had been a full-on tail wind, so that last 20k into the wind was when I realized I’d seriously overcooked myself. Let’s just celebrate that there’s no internet archive where you can find my 10k split and leave it at that. But I digress.

Why can’t I tell Z about my Wilmington, NC purchase? Because it was everything he’s not. It was spendy, frivolous, flat out silly. Z likes to remind me that the mountain bike that he rides all the time he picked up at a garage sale, back in the day, for $50. When we were hangin’ he drove a worn in Toyota Corolla wagon with more miles than he had lunch ball points. His computer was ancient. I remember a landline in the crib. Prob still there. Because why not, it works, he’d correctly say. Z is a reminder that you never have to recycle, reuse, or reduce if you don’t ever replace.

So, no, he’ll never know what is on a 3,042 mile journey from his NC to my WA. Like my 10k run split, a national secret of the highest order. Better that way. He’d be disappointed. And Z, the best guy in the world, is that last person I’d want to disappoint.