Knicks in...5?
My week and a half of sports fandom
I don’t care about sports (read: I was kind of bad at them). Sports and I have a you’re fired — actually I quit! relationship, with the exception of when I made it onto the tennis team by the hair of my chinny chin chin. Later, I won the MVP award for my “coachability” and “attitude.” The co-winner won for her “killer backhand” and “undefeated season.”
I like watching sports less than I like playing them, though maybe it would help if I understood what was going on.
I aced the AP calculus exam. I wrote a 60 page thesis. I could not tell you how football works.
If you put a gun to my head while I watched a Dallas Cowboys game… I actually can’t even continue this hyperbole. That’s how little comprehension I have. And this is not me trying to brag! I’m genuinely confounded by my own inability to understand this sport. I grew up in Texas so I should’ve at least osmosis’d something from the hundreds of games I not only saw on TV, but attended, in person, with cognitive abilities supposedly intact.
I have stared at the screen and willed myself to focus. I have asked friends to explain the positions, the yard lines. I have eaten the seven layer dip. And yet.
Every time I try to beat down my inner liberal arts grinch and lock in on the game, the Cool Girl monologue from Gone Girl starts playing in my head, and I am immediately prohibited from absorbing or understanding what’s going on onscreen. At this point, I think it’s some niche variation of long covid, where as soon as I hear “first down”, a heavy brain fog settles in and I can no longer keep track of names, numbers, rules, or smell beer.
Anyways I don’t care about sports, but I do care about trying to succeed at my job. And when you’re an assistant to a bunch of writers, and they give you the floor, it’s usually best to have something at least a bit new or clever or funny or interesting to say.
Like, no showrunner is going to see an assistant as a future tv writer if her answer to the question “how was your weekend?” is “good!” But if her answer is, “I went to this Korean spa in New Jersey and it was the same people you’d see at the airport but everyone was in swimsuits!” Well, that’s probably better.
So when two weeks ago I went to grab a string cheese from the office fridge, and three of the writers were like, “What’d you think of the game last night?” a panicked feeling came over me. It was the same sensation as when you’re sitting in middle school Spanish class and everyone fishes a paper out of their binders and you look around to see all the papers shuffling through people’s hands into a big pile on the teacher’s desk and realize there was a homework assignment you never knew about. This was my wake-up call. Go. Knicks.
Flash forward to Saturday night, 11 something PM. The clock just ran out, people in blue and orange jerseys are crying and hugging, two bartenders are standing on top of the bar pouring shots into people’s mouths, and the DJ’s cranking “Empire State of Mind.”
I turn and see a girl who I know on good authority still lived in Dallas as of last week, screaming, “Yeah I’m out in Brooklyn// Now I’m down in Tribeca// Right next to DeNiro// But I’ll be hood forever.”
I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t a transcendent experience.
But will I talk about the Knicks at work tomorrow? When the assorted tv writers, people who’ve written on The Americans, Industry, Scandal… fine purveyors of stories and interesting tidbits … ask me about my weekend?
No, I will not.
Because, this weekend something completely unique and insane and magical happened to me.
I was interviewed by Mr. Clean.
My friend from Milwaukee and I were talking about how fun last night was, Knicks in 5!, when I stopped in my tracks. A gigantic shiny man was posing for a photo in front of a freshly painted ad for a cleaning product. Two handlers, authoritative women in black t-shirts, barked commands at him: right foot forward! Now left foot! Let’s try it again, feet staggered this time!
I squeezed Milwaukee’s arm. Is that… Mr. Clean? One of the handlers swiveled and locked eyes with me. She beckoned us over, but Milwaukee, who works a serious finance job held up her hand in front of her face, giggled and pushed me forward. “I’ll leave this one to you!” The handler pushed a pen and paper into my hands; would I be ok if Mr. Clean asked me a few questions on camera?
For a second, my mind went, “What could the implications of this be on my career?” but then I remembered that once, during a particularly long stretch of winter, I reviewed blushes online for a makeup brand I had never heard of for free. The subsequent video still lives in my tagged photos on Instagram, so I reasoned that my days of social media respectability were behind me anyways.
The other handler stood out of frame, behind Mr. Clean, and explained that she would be the one asking questions, but I should give my answers to Mr. Clean himself.
“Describe your shower routine.”
I looked Mr. Clean right in the eye. “Um, I love a fluffy white robe!”
His expression remained unchanged. I wondered if he was wearing colored contacts. His eyes were… well, they were Dawn dishwashing soap blue.
I broke his gaze and looked over to Handler #1, who folded up the life rights I had just signed away before tucking them into a black folder. Handler #2 (she never introduced herself but I would put so much money on her name being Erin) called me right back to attention.
“Do you clean your shower while you shower?”
I cocked my head, and paused, finally understanding how Meghan Markle must’ve felt when Oprah asked her, “Were you silent or were you silenced?”
I wasn’t in a Montecito backyard, but the question landed on me with equal weight. Mostly because I didn’t understand it, so I took a second to deeply ponder, and still, I was flummoxed. Did I clean my shower while I shower?
I looked at Mr. Clean for help, maybe I could find the answer in his dyed white eyebrows, but he was committed to the silent bit. Or maybe he didn’t speak English. I said a little prayer that he was well and not in some sort of Procter & Gamble Get Out situation, and then stammered something about how cleaning while I shower or showering while I clean or showering while I shower sounded like a good idea and I’ll think about it?
Mr. Clean lowered the Swiffer shaped microphone and turned away. Handler #1 gave me a branded cleaning product and thanked me for my time. Milwaukee clapped and asked Mr. Clean if we could take a selfie with him. He looked to Erin who gave a quick nod.
Milwaukee held the phone out and the two of us sidled up to Mr. Clean, who remained stoic, his lips controlled in a tight tan line. As Milwaukee’s thumb moved to capture the selfie, some sort of vestigial tic from last night burst out of me, an excited little, “Go Knicks!”
And there it was. Mr. Clean lit. up. Who knew? He had dimples!
Ok fine, sports. You win this one.
MR CLEAN’S BLEACHED BROWS. He walked so alex consani could run
I thoroughly enjoyed this you are amaze