Tom Wolfe - I Am Charlotte Simmons

“That isn’t what—”

“—other animals can shove your round orange ball through your—”

“Jojo! Listen to me! That ain’t—”

“—fucking basket and whack the shit outta the big motherfuckers the other team’s got inside—” It occurred to Jojo that he had just mentioned three things instead of one. That caused just enough of a hiccup in the gusher of anger for Coach to break in successfully:

“Jojo”—he had his palms up in the whoa whoa stance—“come on! You know me better than that! We been close for a long time. Ever since that night—remember that night?—one second, one split second after midnight, July first—I had your whole telephone number already punched in except for the last digit—and as soon as my watch said twelve-oh-oh, I punched that last digit—it was a seven—right?—I even remember the fucking number—am I right or not!—and I said, ‘Jojo, this is Coach Roth. I want you here at Dupont as much as any player I’ve ever tried to recruit in my entire career.’ That was God’s own truth then, Jojo, and it’s—”

“Yeah, but you just called me a simpleminded shit!”

“—and it’s true now! Christ, I don’t wanna sound sappy, Jojo, but I’ve always though of you as a son. Like my firstborn. If I didn’t, I wouldna used a term like—like what I said. But you and me, we’re so close we can exaggerate to each other to make a point, and I wasn’t even talking about you, in the sense of you, Jojo Johanssen”—he spread his arms out wide, as if Jojo Johanssen were about as grand as things got in this world—“I was talking about this one decision you wanted to make, a course with a prick like Margolies. That’s all. I just thought it wasn’t savvy, and you’re as savvy as any player I’ve ever coached. Why do I depend on you to set picks? I’ll tell you why. You know this game, Jojo. Other players just play the game. But you know the game while you play the game. You see what I mean?”

Part of Jojo didn’t believe a word of it for one moment. And yet…another part of Jojo purred, however reluctantly, under the stroking.

“Yeah, but you shouldna called me that, Coach.”

Coach. Even Jojo realized that his anger had just gotten flattered back down below the Coach/coached barrier.

“Of course I shouldna. But I get emotional when the subject’s a great player like you. I guess that’s a personal defect I got, Jojo, but having somebody like you to coach is what this game is all about, if you’re a coach. Someday, someday way down the line, years from now, when you decide to call it a career on the hardwood, you might wanna be a coach yourself. Oh, you’ll have plenty a other options. Sometime remind me to tell you all the different great things our players have gone on to do. When you play the game the way you do, a lot of doors open, Jojo. You’ll have a lotta options. But if you wanna coach, you’ll be a great coach, Jojo, a great coach, and you’ll understand how much it means”—he tapped his fist against the center of his chest—“to have a player as talented and smart as you are right now.”

Jojo averted his eyes, set his lips into an angry twist, heaved his great chest, and sighed…and nodded his head several times, ever so slightly, in assent, as if to say, “Don’t think for one minute I’m not still angry at you…but I am willing to be justly praised.”

Coach said in as calm a voice as you please, “You know, this is big-time basketball we play here at Dupont, Jojo. It’s as big-time as it gets. But it’s also college, and I think of myself as a teacher, and I am a teacher. I know some players hear me say that, and they think it’s just something I say because it sounds good, but I mean it. I mean it as much as anything I’ve ever meant in my life. We were just talking about Socrates, right? Well, Socrates was a Greek, and in the age of Socrates the Greeks had a saying: Mens sana in corpore sano, a sound mind in a sound body.”

Jojo didn’t know the first thing about Greek, but for some reason that didn’t sound Greek. It sounded more like—that was the problem, he didn’t even know what it sounded more like. He was dying to interrupt Coach and demonstrate the wattage of the Johanssen brain, yet he couldn’t very well interrupt and say something told him Coach was wrong, but he didn’t have the remotest idea what it was.

“See?”—Coach went on—“The Greeks knew something we’ve lost sight of. A good mind don’t mean much unless it’s one and the same thing”—he held up his hands and interlaced his fingers—“with a good body. Mens sana in corpore sano. That’s Greek for ‘If you want a great university, you damn well better have a great athletic program.’ Whether you know it or not, you’re an educational leader here at Dupont. Yeah! A leader. You’re a role model for the whole campus.” He lifted his right hand to eye level and made an almost 180-degree sweep of the hand to indicate the whole campus. “They see a guy like you, and they see what they gotta shoot for. Now, none a those kids are gonna get a body like yours”—he gestured toward the Johanssen body. “A body like yours is a gift from God plus a lot of hard work. But that’s what they oughta shoot for. The reason our program has to put a slightly greater emphasis on the corpore is because it’s our program that teaches the entire student body what protects and fortifies and energizes the mens and enables it to make a difference in the world. We’re all educators—me, you, the whole program. Like I say, you’re a role model. You’re helping teach all of this great university the Greek ideal: Mens sana in corpore sano. Every time they see you out on that hardwood—hell, every time they see you on the campus—they all know you by sight—they all say Go go Jojo—you’re teaching, teaching, teaching, teaching them the Greek ideal: Mens sana in corpore sano, Jojo, mens sana in corpore sano.”

With that, Coach sank back comfortably into the swivel chair and beamed Jojo a Solomonic look.

Shit. Jojo felt like he was treading water in a vat of mineral oil. The goo made him feel like anything he tried to do would be half speed. Was this how his big decision, his big academic turnaround, was winding up—with him floating like a dead bug in a vat of slippery Buster-brand bullshit? With his last ounce of moral courage he said oh so slowly and oh so hoarsely, “I never thought about it that way before, Coach—”

“Of course you didn’t. There was no reason for you to. You’re a great guy and totally committed to the program. Now you step back a few feet and take a look at the big picture and realize what a big part you’re playing.”

“—and I’d like to take the Socrates course, too.”

Coach put his hand over his eyes, massaged his temples with his widespread thumb and middle finger, swiveled about twenty degrees away from Jojo, and let out the kind of sigh that sounds like an eighteen-wheeler’s air brakes. Without turning back toward Jojo or lifting his head or removing his manual eyeshade from his brow, Coach said calmly, softly, albeit wearily, “Jojo, do me a favor. Take a nice long walk before practice tomorrow. Think about what I’ve just told you. Think about your role on this campus and your obligations and loyalties in life. Or if you don’t wanna think about that, then think about a big, enormous, resentful prick. His name is Margolies. Anyway, think about something. Anything. Anything that’ll make you use your head and not just your impulse of the moment.”

He still didn’t look at Jojo. He didn’t budge from his posture of pain. And he didn’t say any more.

So Jojo got up from his chair and stood there a moment. The whole thing was damned awkward.

“Coach—” But he decided not to continue. If he made one final pitch for the Age of Socrates—he wasn’t even up to imagining what might happen.