There Ya Go
Thousands of wrestling fans fill Grand Casino Arena every winter for the Minnesota State Wrestling Tournament. It’s kind of cool to see the cliques of fans that stand out in the crowd — I don’t think that’s by accident. Many wear their school colors. Some don bedazzled jackets. Some of the younger generation even wear tank tops with letters spelling out the name of the wrestler they’re cheering in duct tape.
All of them scream ’til they’re hoarse. But there are also plenty of people in attendance every year who are, so to speak, on the clock. No, I’m not talking about the MSHSL Gestapo, who like ICE agents, systematically pick and choose whom to call out for not sitting in the right seat. I’m talking about myself and my fellow ink-stated wretches and photogs who are there to cover their hometown kids.
Most people don’t comprehend what kind of a sacrifice small-town newspapers make to give these boys and girls welldeserved coverage. Smaller papers like the Headlight don’t typically budget for a three-night hotel stay in the Cities, so it does take a toll on our bottom line. Couple the hotel costs with mileage and parking ($32 bucks a pop), and you’re looking at a nice bill by the time all is said and done.
That’s why it’s good to be me — I’m cheap. Not frugal. Cheap, and once again that trait paid off at this year’s state wrestling tournament.
There is one easy way to tell if someone is a reporter or photog from a smalltown paper at state wrestling. Yes, we have a camera strapped around our neck, and, of course, we wear glow-inthe- dark press credentials and scurry around like confused mice in a maze that has no exit, but the other thing that separates us from the rest of the crowd is what we consume over a three- or four-day period.
By and large, every one of us brings our own food. We bring drinks, sandwiches, chips, bananas. We have to — who among us penny-pinching scribes is going to spend 6 bucks on a bottle of water? Or 10 samolies for a “souvenir” soda?
Who can? Sure, the hotdogs, burgers, pretzels, popcorn and cookie dough — yep, cookie dough — are very enticing, but I can’t justify flashing plastic on those goodies, even if the business is paying for it.
That leads me back to Penny-Pinching Per. This is how cheap I am: The water in my bottle for the second session at this year’s state tourney was the water that the night before was hotel ice cubes — I call it my “souvenir” water. How genius is this? Tara’s word is “gross.” I think it’s … well, cheap is the first word that comes to mind. It’s also responsible spending (cheap?). And the water really was not that bad. It’s water for Pete’s sake.
I used it to wash down my homemade sandwiches, and corn chips and Funyuns I bought at Food Pride before I left. And I even bought the good sandwich meat there since it was on sale that day. For me, that’s called splurging — and local splurging at that!
But these are the lengths we have to take to commit three or four days covering our kids while not breaking the bank.
And it’s worth every pinched penny.
• One other note from the tournament, totally apropos of nothing: It was no surprise to see dozens upon dozens of young children looking down at their laps during wrestling action. They were either scrolling on a smartphone or playing a game on an iPad. Hey, that’s the world we live in, right? But on the third day of the tournament as I was sitting there with not much to do right before one of the sessions was coming to a close, I looked across the aisle to my left and saw a young man — about 5 or 6 — with a small white board on his lap. A white board, not a Whiteboard!
On that board was a lump of bright red Play-doh. Yes, his mom brought Playdoh along! She also had some other small toys he could use with his clay to create whatever his imagination would let him. Remember imagination! It sounds weird, but it was pretty refreshing for this 50-some-year-old to see a kid using all of fingers to stay occupied — not just his thumbs.
