Hunt: A final farewell as this column has come full circle (almost)

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This is my last appearance in this space — more on that in a moment — so it’s fitting, I suppose that I tell you a story about how things have come almost full circle.

This tale goes back to the days when I wrote a weekly column called “Snapshots,” which first appeared on Jan. 1, 2000. It was the forerunner to this one, stories from when the kids, and later the grandkids, were small. It ran for 12 years or so … fun years I remember fondly.

Relatively early in the run, a regular reader named Nancy Rearick dropped by our office, then on Prospect Street, with a book, All Over But The Shoutin’, an autobiography written by then-New York Times Pulitzer Prize winning reporter Rick Bragg.

She said my writing reminded her of his. After I read it, I realized what a huge compliment that was. I’ve read that book six or seven times since, the last as recently as a couple of months ago, and I marvel at it every time. Anyway, it was 20-plus years ago that Nancy left me that book. I’ve since added another Bragg book to my collection, The Prince of Frogtown. It was  the continuation of his life story, about marrying his wife and the bond he developed with his stepson. The back cover bio revealed that he now lived with his family in Alabama, where he is a professor of journalism at the University of Alabama. 

A couple of years ago, I found his email address and told him what I just told you. It was a fan letter, essentially, explaining that, but for geography, our upbringings were remarkably similar. Of course he’s written a bunch of books, worked for the New York Times and won a Pulitzer, but before then…

Anyway, he was kind enough to write back to say it made his day.

Here’s where it gets good. Brent Grant, who works in roadway operations for the City of Fredericton, is a good friend of mine. I’ve been at this long enough that I covered his own success as an athlete and coach and now those of his two sons, Jack and Max.

Max is a talented baseball player, who now plays second base for the University of Alabama Crimson Tide.

In the spirit of “nothing ventured, nothing gained” I scribbled a note to Brent telling him what I’ve just told you. I said that if both Max and Mr. Bragg would sign the email, I would happily frame it and put it on my personal wall of fame , which includes autographed photos of myself with Jean Beliveau, Bobby Orr and Willie O’Ree.

“I will have Max go see him, Bill,” he promised. “Cool story.”

Well, it’s a work in progress. They never connected face-to-face – both are busy, it’s a sprawling campus – but Bragg signed a book and left it at the administrative desk of his department for Max to pick up. Something was lost in translation: He signed it to Max, rather than me. No matter. Max will autograph it too, and it will become a keepsake.

That’s the plan, but it hasn’t happened yet.

“I can’t make this up … it’s unbelievable,” Brent said.

Max picked the book up, all right. He tucked it into the ball bag/knapsack he carried on to the plane for his flight home to Fredericton. His roommate has the identical bag and he too was heading out. They mixed up the bags.

“By the time they figured this out, the other guy was in Nashville, Tennessee,” Brent Grant explained.

“But you’re going to get it … you’re going to get it,” he promised.

See? Almost full circle from the day that Nancy Rearick – now 84 years old – dropped that book off at the office on Prospect Street. And time, it seems, to step away from this space for good.

I was lucky enough to be asked to continue writing this column after retirement in June 2022, and have done so happily.

But in truth, it hasn’t felt like genuine retirement. There was still the process of coming up with a column idea, lining up the interview, sitting down to do it, taking the photo and writing it down – my favourite part. But as the late Los Angeles Times columnist Jim Murray once wrote: “The trouble with writing a column is, it’s like running a railroad. You have to keep the stock rolling … if you write a book, a play, a movie … you can bask in reflected glory (if it’s good) for a while. With  a column, it’s around the fish.”

It’s been a great ride. Great fun. But I’m closing the railroad.

Thanks for everything, friends.

Happy New Year. 

We’ll see you around.