Trying to Save Piggy Sneed

by John Irving

  (I never expected, not quite 10 years later, that The World According to Garp would enable me to support myself by my writing alone. I don't miss teaching Creative Writing -- it was hard and time-consuming work. But it was honorable, worthwhile work, and of use to my students -- if only to a few of them.)

  In a separate conversation I asked Mr. Fox if he would publish Setting Free the Bears if it came across his desk at Random House today. My friend Joe hesitated, just a moment too long, before saying, "Well, yes, but..." I think the answer is no.

  My Two Champions

  I taught Creative Writing, at one place or another, for a total of 11 years; yet I continued to coach wrestling long after the publication of The World According to Garp freed me of the financial need for an outside job. I coached until 1989, when I was 47, not only because I preferred coaching to teaching but for a variety of other reasons; the foremost reason was the success of my two elder sons in the sport -- they were better wrestlers (and better athletes) than I had been, and coaching them meant more to me than my own modest accomplishments as a competitor.

  Colin, who wrestled at Northfield Mount Hermon, was a prep-school All-American at 152 pounds -- at the annual Lehigh tournament in 1983. Colin also won the New England Class A title at l60 pounds in '83; ironically, he pinned a guy from Exeter in the finals. Colin was voted the Outstanding Wrestler in the Class A tournament, for which he received the Ted Seabrooke Memorial trophy. I would have been happier if Ted had been alive to see Colin win the championship. Ted had seen Colin wrestle only once, when Colin was just starting the sport.

  "He's got much longer arms than you ever had," Coach Seabrooke told me. "You ought to show him a crossface-cradle." By the time Colin was a Class A Champion and an All-American, he was pinning half his opponents with a crossface-cradle.

  At six feet two and a half, Colin was tall for a middleweight. I think that his college coach was well intentioned but mistaken to put Colin on a weight-lifting program in order to beef him up to the 177-pound class, and then to 190. Colin was not a natural light heavyweight; he was at his best as a tall middleweight. Nowadays -- Colin is 30 years old -- he stays out of the weight room and rides a mountain bike; he's a very lean 175.

  His younger brother Brendan was, like me, a lightweight; unlike me, Brendan was a tall lightweight -- at five feet eleven and a half, Brendan is so thin that he looks like a six-footer. (I'm only five feet eight, "normal" for a lightweight.) Unremarkably, both Colin and Brendan grew up in wrestling rooms; rolling around on a mat was second nature to them -- I remember that Brendan learned to walk on a wrestling mat. Unlike Colin, who didn't start competing as a wrestler before his prep-school years, Brendan had already won six junior-school New England tournaments before his prep-school career began. (Brendan won his first wrestling tournament at the weight of 82V2 pounds.) By the time Brendan was wrestling for Vermont Academy, the other wrestlers -- and, especially, the other coaches -- in the New England Class A league were watching him closely to see if he would live up to the reputation of being Colin living's little brother; this was a burden for Brendan, largely because his proneness to injury was unlike anything Colin had ever suffered.

  Brendan placed third in the New England Class A tournament his sophomore year at Vermont Academy; it was a good finish to a bad season for him, because the tournament was only a month after he'd had knee surgery for torn cartilage -- he'd missed most of the '87 season. In '88, he was seeded second in the Class A tournament; he'd had an undefeated dual-meet season, excepting two losses to injury-default. Then, in the semifinals of the tournament, he reinjured the knee and was pinned by a boy he'd pinned earlier in the season; the injury forced him to drop out of the Class A's -- and he reinjured the same knee at the Navy wrestling camp in Annapolis that summer. He spent the rest of the summer and the fall in physical therapy.

  Colin lost a close match in the Class A finals his junior year -- to a boy he'd beaten easily in the dual-meet season. Colin didn't win the New England Class A title until his senior year. Brendan's senior year began badly. A separated shoulder and a torn rotator-cuff tendon eliminated him from a Christmas tournament. Brendan was the 1989 team captain at Vermont Academy, but he would spend the heart of the season on the bench. When his shoulder healed, he was back in the lineup for three matches; he won all three -- then he sat out another three weeks with mononucleosis. (Then he knocked out a front tooth.)

  The week before the New England Class A's, Brendan was wrestling at St. Paul's when the St. Paul's wrestler, who was losing at the time and repeatedly being put in a crossface-cradle, bent back two of Brendan's fingers on his right hand and broke them at the big knuckle joints. Under the finger-bending rule (all four or none), Brendan won the match, despite having to default with the injury. But the damage had been done: the fingers wouldn't heal by the time of the tournament -- Brendan would wrestle at the Class A's with two broken fingers.

  To add insult to injury, the mother of the St. Paul's wrestler objected to the referee's decision to award the match to Brendan because of her son's illegal hold; when a wrestler is injured by an illegal hold, and cannot continue wrestling, he wins. But the St. Paul's mother declared that Brendan had been injured prior to the match; she'd seen a Band-Aid on one of his fingers -- one of the now-broken fingers. (Brendan had skinned a knuckle while scraping the ice off his car's windshield that morning, on his way to weigh in.) I had to restrain myself from sending the St. Paul's mother a videocassette of the match. The St. Paul's wrestler not only clearly broke Brendan's fingers; with his other hand, Brendan was pointing to his bent fingers -- to draw the referee's attention to the foul -- when the two fingers broke. The ref had made the right call, but he should have spotted the injury-in-progress -- he could have prevented it.

  Given the accumulation of Brendan's injuries, and his small number of matches in the '89 season, the seeding committee at the New England Class A tournament was entirely justified in seeding Brendan no higher than fifth in the 135-pound class; there were seven other wrestlers in the weight class with winning records. As his coach -- I was an assistant coach at Vermont Academy for one year and the head coach for Brendan's last two seasons -- I had contemplated moving Brendan up to the 140-pound class. In previous seasons, Brendan had pinned the two best wrestlers who would be the finalists in that weight class; in the 1989 Class A's, 140 was a weaker weight than 135. But Brendan, who was always admirably stubborn -- even as a small child -- insisted that 135 was his weight class; he didn't want to move up. (No wrestler wants to move up a weight class.)

  The New England Class A tournament was at Exeter that year -- in the new gym, where I'd never wrestled. (I have no idea what the pit is used for now.) I had a good team at little Vermont Academy in '89. In the Class A team standings, we would finish third -- behind Deerfield and Exeter, two much bigger schools. I would send three Vermont Academy wrestlers to the finals, and two of them would win -- Brendan was one of Vermont's two champions. He pinned the number-four seed from Northfield Mount Hermon in the quarterfinals, he pinned the number-one seed from Hyde in the semifinals, and he pinned the number-two seed from Worcester in the finals; he stuck his broken fingers, which were rebroken in the semifinals, in a bucket of ice between the rounds.

  Tom Williams, who would die of cancer in three years, came to the tournament. Colin was there. My wife, Janet, was there; for two years, she'd not missed a match of Brendan's -- and she'd taken what seemed, at the time, to be an excessive number of photographs. (As time passes, I'm grateful for every picture.) My mother had come up from Florida to see the tournament. And my old Exeter teammate, Charles C. ("Brute") Krulak -- General Krulak -- had come to see Brendan, too. Chuck had seen Brendan win the Lakes Region tournament (now known as the Northern New England tournament) the previous year; he'd promised Brendan that he would come to see him wrestle in the New England Class A's -- but only if Brendan would promise to win the tournament. Brendan had promised, and Brendan had done it. (To be truthful, I'd always known h
e could. But he'd been so banged-up, I didn't think he would.)

  I had spent so many hours of my life at wrestling tournaments, and so many more hours in wrestling rooms. After Exeter and Pittsburgh and Iowa and Windham, there were the hours in the wrestling room at Amherst College and at the Buckingham Browne & Nichols School -- and at Harvard, at the New York Athletic Club, at Northfield Mount Her-mon, and at Vermont Academy, too. It was the perfect closure ... that it should end at Exeter, where it began. I knew I would still be a visitor to the occasional wrestling room, and that I would still put on the shoes -- if only to roll around on the mat with Colin or Brendan, or with another old ex-wrestler of my generation -- but my life in wrestling effectively ended there.

  The Phillips Exeter Academy wrestling team, 1961--Captain John Irving (front row, center). Irving's regular workout partners were Mike McClave (front row, second from right) and AI Keck (front row, second from left). Larry Palmer, who ate the famous half-pound piece of toast, is seated to Irving's right. The man in the coat and tie is Coach Ted Seabrooke. PHOTO: '61 PEAN

  John Irving (on top) at 133 pounds in '61. Despite two undefeated dual-meet seasons, he never won a New England title. PHOTO: '61 PEAN

  Larry Palmer (on top) at 121 pounds in '61 --he failed to make weight at the New England Interscholastic tournament that year. In '62, six inches taller and 26 pounds heavier, Palmer won the New England Class A title at 147 pounds. (Larrry Palmer is now Professer of Law at Cornell Law School.) PHOTO: '61 PEAN

  Ted Seabrooke coaching 137-pounder Al Keck in '61. The fans are draped on the rails of the overhanging wooden track that circumscribed "the pit" at Exeter. PHOTO: '61 PEAN

  Cliff Gallagher coaching in the Exeter wrestling room in 1966. It must be before practice, because the door to the wrestling room is partially open and there are so few bodies rolling around; Cliff always came to practice early. The boy sitting on the mat must be a first-year wrestler-- he's not wearing wrestling shoes. PHOTO: BRADFORD F. HERZOG

  In the University of Iowa wrestling room, 1973: Dan Gable catches John Irving with a foot-sweep. PHOTO: GARY WINOGRAD

  Irving's son Colin, a 1983 prep-school All-American for Northfield Mt. Hermon at 152 pounds-- Colin was also the 160-pound New England Class A Champion in '83. PHOTOGRAPHER UNKNOWN

  Colin Irving completing an upper-body throw in the '83 New England Class A finals. Both the referee and the mat judge (upper left) are anticipating the pin. PHOTO: C.F.N.I.

  Colin driving his Exeter opponent's shoulders to the mat in the 160-pound finals. PHOTO: C.F.N.I.

  A legal headlock: the head encircled with an arm contained--in this case, Colin has his opponent's head and both his arms contained. Colin's pin in the finals at 1:45 of the first period won him the Ted Seabrooke Memorial Trophy for the Outstanding Wrestler in the '83 New England Class A tournament. PHOTO: C.F.N.I.

  Summer '84 brothers--Colin with Brendan in Bridgehampton, New York. Colin is 19, and at his heaviest--about 195 pounds. Brendan is 14; he weighs about 105 pounds. PHOTO MARY ELLEN MARK

  Brendan Irving (right), a tall 135-pounder with a proneness to injury: knee surgery in '87; reinjured the knee in '88; in '89, a separated shoulder, a torn rotator cuff, a lost front tooth, two broken fingers (right hand), mononucleosis, and a championship title. PHOTO: STEVE IRVING

  Brendan (black headgear) going for the pin: between 1984 and 1989, he won over 90 percent of his matches by a fall. Brendan was captain of the Vermont Academy team in '89. PHOTO: JANET IRVING

  The semifinals: Brendan Irving, seeded fifth at 135 pounds, pins the number-one seed at 4:40 of the third period. Brendan pinned all his opponents in the '89 New England Class A tournament. PHOTO: JANET IRVING

  Coach Irving embracing son Brenden, seconds after Brendan won the '89 New England Class A title at135 pounds-- by a fall in 4:52 of the third period. PHOTOGRAPHER UNKNOW

  At 31 pounds, Everett looks like a future middleweight. PHOTO: COOK NEILSON

  I put my Vermont Academy wrestlers on the team bus with my co-coach, Mike Kennelly, and I asked Mike and the team to forgive me for not riding on the bus with them one last time. I wanted to ride back to Vermont in Colin's car, with Colin and Brendan. On the long drive home (we were still somewhere in New Hampshire), Colin picked up a speeding ticket -- shortly after delivering a lecture to Brendan and me about the infallibility of his new radar-detection system. But we could laugh about the ticket. Brendan, like his brother before him, had won the New England Class A title. It was the happiest night of my life.

  My Last Weighin

  I suppose I could mope around, wishing that my wrestling career, as a competitor, had ended half as happily as my life as a coach. But I think I've been lucky: I've always taken more pleasure from my children than I have from myself; I enjoy my children, and I try not to drive them -- I drive myself.

  In 1976, I was in the middle of The World According to Garp, and I was struggling with it -- the novel had three first chapters, and I couldn't decide whether Garp or his mother was the main character. I had applied for a Guggenheim, but I didn't know that this time I was going to get one -- I'd applied and hadn't gotten one before. I was teaching at Mount Holyoke -- an all-women's college in South Hadley, Massachusetts -- and I was working out in the wrestling room at Amherst College.

  Henry Littlefield was the coach at Amherst then; Henry was a heavyweight -- everything about him was grand. He was more than expansive, he was eloquent; he was better than good-humored, he was jolly. Henry was very rare, a kind of Renaissance man among wrestling coaches, and the atmosphere in the Amherst wrestling room was, to Henry's credit, both aggressive and good-natured -- a difficult combination to achieve.

  I was living in a faculty house on the edge of the Mount Holyoke athletic fields -- Colin and Brendan had a great "yard" to play in, and the college pool to swim in. I arranged my classes so that I could run or use the weight room at the Mount Holyoke gym in the early morning; I would write for a couple of hours at midday -- and again, late at night, after the children were in bed. In the afternoons, I would drive to the Amherst wrestling room; I often took Colin with me -- he was 10 and 11 that wrestling season.

  I weighed 162 when that season began; there was a postseason open tournament at Springfield College, and I intended to enter it at I36V2 pounds. I was 34; the weight came off a little harder than it once had. After three months, I was holding my weight pretty easily at 142; the rest, as wrestlers frequently say, was "just water." That was all I was drinking in those months -- just water. I had half a grapefruit with a teaspoon of honey for breakfast, and usually an apple or a banana; I had a bowl of oatmeal with a teaspoon of maple syrup for lunch; for dinner, I had some steamed fish and vegetables -- lots of vegetables.

  The last week before the tournament I was consistently weighing under 140, but I couldn't get under 138 -- that was the "water." Then I got sick; I had bronchitis, and the antibiotic was intolerable on my empty stomach. The doctor told me I had to eat to save my stomach, or give up the antibiotic; I couldn't give up the antibiotic because I couldn't wrestle with bronchitis. I tried to soothe my stomach with a little yogurt, or some skim milk. I felt better, but in two days I weighed 145. I couldn't make the 1361/2-pound class, although I knew it was my best wrestling weight. The next weight class was 1491/2; I started eating more oatmeal, and I added some rice to the steamed fish and vegetables.

  At Springfield I weighed in at 147, with all my clothes on -- and I'd eaten breakfast before the weighins. The other contenders at 149V2 were stripped naked; they exhaled their last breath before stepping on the scales. I tried not to notice how big they were. I was in the training room, getting taped -- I had had a "loose" left pinky finger all season; it kept dislocating at the big knuckle joint -- and

  Colin was looking grim. He was just beginning to get interested in wrestling; he had watched every detail of the weighins.

  "What are you thinking, Colin?" I asked him.

  "You look like a thirty-six-pounder, Dad," Colin
said.

  I had never thought of the tournament at Springfield as my last tournament; all I'd hoped was to win one or two matches -- and maybe place. It hadn't occurred to me that watching me lose might be painful for Colin. For Brendan, who was only six that spring, watching me wrestle, win or lose, was no big deal. Colin was old enough to realize that losing a wrestling match took a lot more out of me than losing a couple of sets of weekend tennis to a friend.

  I drew a wild man in the first round. "Talent is overrated," Ted Seabrooke used to say. The guy was talented, and very dangerous, but he was also stupid. I was overcautious in the first period; I pulled out of a couple of sure takedowns because I was afraid of an upper-body throw that the wild man appeared to like in the underhook position -- I came out ahead on takedowns, anyway. It was in the top position that the wild man was most dangerous. He was a leg man, and he hit me with a cheap tilt off a cross-body ride. (I was lucky it was only the tilt I got caught in; what the leg man was looking for was a bent-leg Turk -- very uncomfortable.) I'd been leading 6-3, but the near-fall tied it up at 6-6 -- and I was still on the bottom. Off the whistle, the leg man put in his near leg for the cross-body ride again, but this time I drilled his head into the mat before he could tie up my far arm; it was a most basic defense against a cross-body ride. Ted Seabrooke had warned me that the move wouldn't work against a good leg man, but this guy wasn't good -- he was sloppy.