A scotch. A tall one. I deserved it. It was one of many things I deserved. You've got to get to a place where you can give yourself the things you deserve. Be your own parents. Grow the fuck up. Not everyone wants you to do that.

I came from what could be called a broken home. I never liked the term because it seemed to me things were more broken when my mother was around. With her gone things got better quick. No one wants to hear that. I had four social workers very concerned about me until I realized they just wanted me to say I missed my mommy. See, that's what's written in the book. It says in there that kids with no mom wish they had a mom. All of them. All the time. Even if the only mom they knew stank of gin and stole their money and resented them for the stretch marks on their waist and the man in their bed.

So broken didn't seem to capture it. But broken marriage. That's a term I can get behind. And maybe my father, God rest him, would agree with me on this one.

People think I'm stupid, that they can read me but I can't read them. And here's one stupid thing people think: they somehow think that everything I've learned, coaching football at the highest level, studying people for a living, going out and playing a chess game every week with some of the smartest football guys in the world, people somehow think I can't read people. They say I know football as if that's a whole hell of a lot different that knowing people. I do. It ain't.

So they think I'm stupid. They think when we're talking I don't see them pitying me. They think I don't see them imagining my poor bachelor pad, littered with pizza boxes and dirty laundry. They think I am emotionally unfulfilled and long for more and its written all over their face with magic marker.

I ought to tell them, tell one of them at least, that this is why restaurants were invented. And the dry cleaners. And no I do not wear nice clothes, but I do make king money in some countries doing what I do.

My marriage with Gladys is over. Broken. At the end of the day, I don't miss it. There isn't anything more to it than that. I'm not a lonely man. My relationship with my players is like that of father and sons. I love that job and I do it until I'm exhausted and we've won every game there is to win. When did that become so hard to believe? None of my father's friends ever thought he was lonely. He was a damn good high school coach. He loved it. That was good enough.

Since then everyone I fucking talk to has gotten a bad case of the touchy feelies. No, I don't mind living alone. No, I don't mind having a nice apartment to myself at the end of the day, being able to have a glass of scotch without feeling guilty, acting like a grown up instead of a fucking child in a petting zoo.

If they were half as able as me to read people they'd be able to see that.

I have one friend, a college friend -- where else would I meet a guy like this? I have this one friend and I know exactly what he'll say. That I doth protest too much. Well, he hasn't had to live through all the emphatic pats on the shoulder and meaningless well wishes. He would protest this much, too, if he had to put up with so much fucking doth.

So I poured myself a scotch and then I drank it and poured myself another one and I ain't going to explain why that doesn't worry me because that's the entire point. I can do that on occasion without setting off alarm bells about My Drinking. I can stay late in the video room and not have to break for a phone call because I'm working and when did we turn this world over to the women?

Women have good insights. I get that. I'm not suggesting a life of celibacy or misogyny. God knows I have enough money to be with women. Not prostitution. Money just brings women around. Nothing mysterious about it. And they have good insights and it's worth talking to one if something's really nagging at you. But men have good insights too. Men can cut through the bullshit. Women can explain the bullshit. Men can cut through it. It's a good team. But we can't let one take over all of society. There's still something valuable in being able to say to somebody, "Nope, that's not it," and letting it stand. That's one thing I have to do everyday. I can't worry about my guys' feelings. Or, better put, they can't think I do.

All of this -- how well I've had to learn to understand people, how well I can communicate, how much I appreciate the yin and yang of male and female because of my work -- all of that I can't tell anyone about. If I try to draw parallels between my work and the rest of my life, I am either a football freak who has no idea or some inspirational ass pimple who is best left in bad movies and high school guidance departments. But I've got to deal with people all the time and those who pay attention know that I lead the league in what I do. I am the best, up there with two other guys. But it's just me and a bunch of men, so how can it apply? How could I know how to read my daughter-in-law, also? I'm just a coach. Far be it form me to penetrate her not very convoluted inner workings.

No, she's as likely to believe that as she is to believe me when I tell her single life treats me just fine, even at my age. Generals used to get some respect. Now they all have unhappy home lives. And if they have no home life, they wish they did. Being the best in the world at what they do could never make up for the tender ministrations of a good woman, no matter how controlling she can be.

That's one thing I'll give to Gladys, as broken as our marriage was, she got that. There's one woman out there who believes that I don't really miss her. Who believes that I can read people from all walks of life, that I get the emotional IQ thing and am still happy with my own life. Have to hand it to Gladys on that. I know she gets it because she told me as she left.

"Damn, Bill. You won't even miss me. You're just not the marrying kind. I realized a year ago you wouldn't even miss me. Somehow I take comfort in that. It allows me not to take it personally. How could I? No matter what you think of me, and I know you think pretty highly of me, you'd miss me a wee bit if it was about me. But it's not. You won't miss me, you wouldn't miss anybody. Your job. You'd miss your job. Some day that will leave you, too. I don't know what then. But for now. You won't even miss me."

Exact words. Then out the door. Carrying a little bag.

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