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CARLTON PEAK… This is quite a meaningful week for so many people and for so many reasons. With the Thanksgiving holiday here, some folks make a conscious effort to set aside time to reflect and give thanks for the positive things life has had to offer them. Others not so much, but most everyone uses this time of year to get together with family and friends and celebrate another year gone by since the last Grand Turkey Day. Hopefully it was a positive one for you and you have many things to smile about as another calendar year winds down.
Most big sports fans have heard the saying that sports is life and life is sports. I can see that, especially anytime I reflect on my own experiences between the two. I have been extraordinarily lucky when it comes to both. Between participation and just being a fan, I have tons of positive memories from both and am truly thankful for them. For my family and friends? I have been fortunate to have some truly remarkable people in my life. Sometimes that becomes challenging and bittersweet. While I celebrate my father and give thanks for him, I can also see him slipping away, slowly succumbing to a battle with cancer. At 85 it’s a fight he won’t win.
I contemplate the emotions that will come to the surface, knowing I probably won’t be in a state of total gut-wrenching agony, but neither will I be stoic about it. I myself cheated that fight years ago, slipping through the ropes and out of the ring when the disease wasn’t looking. But there were few hospital stays when I didn’t see some less fortunate patients wheeled down the hallway covered by sheets, their time up and over with. Perhaps I have been steeled by what I went through and what I saw. I’m not kidding myself, though—it will be a harsh reminder when the day comes. In the meantime I am giving thanks, thanks for a whole bunch of things.
Thanks for my mom and dad, for my kids Chelsey and William, and grandkids, little Jewel Annie and Wyatt the big Wy-guy. For my brother Paul and all of his family, and for my youngest brother Ace Zamberletti and his family. For my grandparents and all of my relatives. And thanks for all of the special canine friends I have had and one pretty special cat. I have gotten to meet so many special people that the list could fill these pages.
Thanks for all the places I have had the privilege to travel to and the beautiful world I have gotten to experience. Thanks for the education, learning, and knowledge I have gotten to take in. (Maybe I’ll use it someday?) Thanks for getting to see Rod Carew steal home base once. For King Henry’s diner in St. Paul when I was a kid. Thanks for the chance to be 10 feet from Muhammad Ali once when he was doing his best shtick and poetry ever. Thanks for the Miracle on Ice and for getting to shake Herbie Brooks’ hand over in Eveleth the day he went into the USA hockey Hall of Fame. Thanks for getting to grow up in St. Paul (West ender forever), to live on the mighty Mississippi (I was a champ sand-bagger as a teenager), and on the North Shore. Thanks for being able to say I AM a Minnesotan and proud of it.
Thanks for the day the Vikes beat the Rams to go to the Super Bowl and the day Ace and I stood on the Vikes’ logo at midfield in the cold and snow until an usher walked out to us and said it was time to go. We were about the last guys there. Thanks for the ’65, ’87, and ’91 Twins—that’s baseball nirvana right there. Thanks for the Stanley Cup, the finest trophy of any kind, anywhere. Thanks for the Kentucky Derby, one of the best sports events bar none. Thanks for the 64-65 CHL St. Paul Ranger champs—got the team photo annnnnnd a jersey! Thanks for all the years of the old AWA, some of the best entertainment ever. (And yeah, it was real, in case you were still wondering, wink!)
Thanks for getting to be at the “U” in 1977 when the football Gophers beat number-one Michigan 16-0. Had seats 20 feet from the field. The next day I would check in at the U Hospital to prepare for a 10-hour operation and what would turn out to be a 10-week recovery stay. It was the front end of three years of mental and physical hell. Thanks for getting to go to four Frozen Fours and to see my favorite club win three of them. Thanks for the Bulldog national title. I was about 600 miles from St. Paul that night and will bet just about anything that my yell was heard inside the arena. That was as sports awesome as it gets. Thanks for the great UMD football program. Thanks for old-time Bemidji Beaver hockey and Bob Peters.
Thanks for all of the sports characters who have graced us with their presence in the North Star State at one time or another: Herbie, Glen Sonmor, Verne Gagne, Bud Grant, Kirby Puckett, Fred Zamberletti, Fran Tarkenton, Tom Kelly, Al Shaver, Harmon Killebrew, Norman Van Brocklin, Billy Martin, Mad Dog Vachon, the Purple People Eaters, Louie Nanne, the Carlson brothers (a.k.a. “The Hansons”), The Crusher, Sertie, Ray Christianson, Halsey Hall, Herb Carneal, Calvin Griffith, Sheik Adnan Al-Kassey, Gump Worsley, The Body (or Governor Turnbuckle), The Baron, The Brain, The Brotens, Mean Gene, and Wally Karbo. And thanks for Gopher and UMD women’s hockey; between these two programs they own just about all of the NCAA Frozen Four titles.
Thanks for all the nights when the Fan Jr. or the Fan Girl and I would be on the way home after a UMD hockey tilt and stop at Stony Point on a frozen winter’s night to take in the northern lights. We would turn off the car lights to get a better view and stare in silence at the night beauty. There are a million dreams in those stars on those nights… Happy Thanksgiving to all and PEACE!    
MFAN EXTRA: And thanks for the Duluth Reader Weekly!! OVER & OUT!!

Marc Elliott is a sports opinion writer who splits his time between Minnesota and his hometown in Illinois.