The Inside Rail

And then there was one. The last page in the last paper, I think I’ve been here before, trying to find the words for the long goodbye. 

It’s down to this, the pressure of one final deadline and the levity of one final deadline. Tomorrow, I’ll watch races but my voice recorder will be at home, I won’t scramble around trying to figure out where the winner’s watching the race, I’ll simply enjoy a race like everyone else. I’ll laugh at things people say, but I won’t wonder if I can print them. I’ll eat a real meal at a real table and go to bed when I want, instead of when the paper allows. That goes for Tom, Joe and the rest of The Special team who have brought you this year’s volume of work, our 16th loop on this crazy ride.

It’s that time of year. Time for the annual – or at least occasional – ‘I’ll miss, I won’t miss,’ from Saratoga. I have a list, you have a list, everybody has a list as Saratoga fades away for another season. With all its energy and charm, Saratoga brings stress and angst. There is nowhere else where we are so on for so long. It’s not love/hate, as I will never hate the place, for me, it’s miss/won’t miss. 

The Salvation Army rings its bell. A woman in a slinky black dress and six-inch heals unfolds a baby carriage, while holding an infant, bumps her arm and shows it to her man, he kisses it gently, they walk into the races. 

A security guard waits in the shade. Louie, who played catcher on the last softball team I played on, tells me about a photo he took of a bathing cat. Chad Brown wins another race. A grandmother takes a photo of granddaughter and grandfather, the grandfather takes a photo of granddaughter and grandmother, then an EMT steps in and takes a photo of all three together, they smile and thank him. 

“What did you think of Saturday?”

It was a simple question, asked Sunday morning, after a long Saturday and longer Saturday night.

Like a lawnmower starting on one pull, I said what I thought of Travers Saturday. It lasted awhile. 

“Are you going to write any of that?”

I hesitated. 

“I should,” I said. 

“Yeah, you should.” 

It’s Saturday afternoon, as I sit down to write this. A blank page stares at me, the horses for the third race canter to the start, Tom Law handicaps Sunday’s races, Linzay Marks sketches a scene for an ad, Joe just walked in the office, he looks like a run-over dog, the interns – fresh off a 72-page deadline and a night out on Caroline Street – are at the races, ready to hammer out some of the words to issue number 29. As I write this, the Travers lies in wait, five hours away. 

Of all the mornings on the backside of Saratoga, it might be my favorite. It was pouring, only the diehards had come out, huddled and hovered under the awning of the Morning Line Kitchen on Travers morning. All of us should have gone home, but somehow stayed, wasting and preserving time all at the same time. 

We are at the stage where solitude is sought. So many conversations, so little sleep, so many late deadlines, so few square meals, so many requests, so little peace. 

Driving the golf cart in the morning has its plusses, you can escape, until someone grabs the windshield stanchion and won’t let go. You get stuck, listening to stories about their first time to Saratoga, fielding suggestions for things we should write in the paper, hearing about one more poor-poor-pitiful-me gambling lament. 

“He’s the last one. The last good Flying Zee horse.”

That’s how Phil Serpe described Weekend Hideaway, winner of a Monday allowance race. It was said in passing, as Serpe walked toward his barn and my golf cart went wherever it was going. Looking back on it, I don’t know if it was before or after the 6-year-old son of Speightstown earned his 11th victory in a tough New York-bred allowance Monday, pushing his earnings to over $800,000.

There is no walk like it in sports. Two thick red lines mark the path, as it burrows through bettors and drinkers under the clubhouse, descends a few feet, past the hand stampers and around the bend, past the red railing where the gate crew hangs, then slices diagonally right, past the bands and the dancers, between the food stands, through the charbroiled burger smell, then juts back to the left past the administrative offices, through the jocks’ agents and wives waiting for celebration or commiseration, then a hard right into the sanctuary of the Saratoga jocks’ room. 

Ask, well text, a simple question. 

Doug,

I talked to Catalano about Family Tree, he said Florent isn’t riding her…is this correct? If so, why? Thanks.

– Sean Clancy

Doug Bredar texted back quickly.

It’s a really long story. Call me if you want the details. It’s a good story!

Around here, we like long stories and we like good stories, so I called him back.