Well I Hear You Went Up To Saratoga And Your Horse Naturally Won

It never ceases to amaze me how often we experience six degrees of separation. Take my family for instance. We weren’t wealthy but growing up, we did have an in-ground pool.  As common as it was for a bunch of kids to be swimming, it was the same for the guys Dad worked with, or the trainers and jockeys he knew from the track to pop over for a swim on hot summer nights. After a quick drink at the bar next door of course.

Being a regular at the restaurant son #3 works at, the track announcer and he became friends. He joined us once for Christmas dinner and was there when Wingman died. A man with a quick wit when calling races, he had a memorable one in 2010 that led to a contract with NBC calling the Triple Crown. For a couple of summers, my son and I visited him in the call booth at Saratoga. At dinner on one of those trips, a local trainer came to the table with his son and while the men chatted, I spoke to the son, a senior football player.

The day this March that I started working back in retail, the store manager resigned. The assistant manager was promoted to store manager-I worked with her seven years and two jobs ago. She in turn hired a woman who filled in during maternity leaves. Through introductions, she said her family consisted of her high school senior daughter, her son, a college student who played football in high school, and her husband, a horse trainer.

That’s right, I’m working for the woman whose husband and son I met in Saratoga a few years ago.

Last Saturday, I went to the track with my friend/manager. Her husband had a horse in the stake race, so for the first time since my Dad raced Shining Lindy, I got to enter the inner Paddock-the area exclusively for horse family. I have a love/hate relationship with the track over this race. When Wingman died, son #1 lived in Korea and needed a day to get home. I planned the wake for Sunday-forgetting it was the same day as the stake race. The only way from my house to the funeral home was THROUGH the track traffic, so our 8 minute drive took 30 minutes. My Mom always said I’d be late for my own funeral but we were embarrassingly late for Wingman’s wake. Three years later, I watched Triple Crown winner American Pharaoh gallop to victory. I imagined my Dad in his free stakes hat, toasting with a Manhattan. Damn, I miss that man.

The race ended with a jockey being thrown, an inquiry, and the disqualification of the 1st place horse. The trainer’s horse, although not the winner, finished in the money so while sad to see a jockey hurt, at least it was a profitable day for them. And when I mentioned the people I was with to my Mom, she remembered that the trainer’s dad and mine were good enough friends that he use to come swimming at our house. 50 years before meeting this Cali-raised gal, my dad was friends with her father-in law. 

And the announcer who knows the trainer who is married to the woman I work for, with the father in law who knew my dad? This is the race that got him national attention. It sure is fun to listen to.