BY DAN VALENTI

PLANET VALENTI NEWS AND COMMENTARY

(FORTRESS OF SOLITUDE, MONDAY JULY 2, 2018) — This is THE PLANET‘s 1,800th column since we began in late September-early October of 2010. We saved it for something, and someone, special.

The week before last, THE PLANET was honored to accept an invitation from our Right Honorable Good Friend John Krol to appear on “Good Morning, Pittsfield” in the show’s last week broadcasting from the soon-to-be-defunct ghost building known as Taconic High School. Probably much to Krol’s surprise and perhaps relief, we were in no mood to discuss politics, particularly the small change of local politics. We took the guest spot as a valedictory to …

… to what, exactly? We weren’t sure, and after countless thousands of radio and TV appearances, THE PLANET has done our best work when we weren’t bound by a script, bullet points, notes, outlines, teleprompters, or any other of the props and assistances that can straightjacket a performance. We love live, in the moment, on the tight wire without a net. Back in our collegiate days and a bit beyond, we moonlighted in stand-up comedy that way, doing improv weaved from a few rough ideas formed before the introduction and channeling our inner Robin Williams.

We were, supposition must declare, being wistful.

Wistful.

It’s a beautiful word that connotatively lies between between the warmth of nostalgia and the mild sorrow of regret. Wistful is that feeling you get when you fondly remember pleasant past experiences that you know can never be repeated. That’s how we got into the twin subjects of sports and philosophy, two areas of inquiry that have always shared the same room in Chateau d’Planet. We told some Berraisms, talked about the 1957 World Series and how we loved the Braves of that year because (a) it was our first dawn-dim awareness of the great game of baseball, (b) the Braves uniforms were cool, and (c) because of grown-up talk that they had until “recently” (1953) been from Boston, diamond home of the GREAT Ted Williams. These were a little boys reasons.

THE PLANET then explained how the influx of gigantic doses of money and commercialism dampened our interest in today’s version of the game, except locally. We congratulated the Taconic High baseball team for advancing to the state finals the year after winning the state, expressing our surprise that — given Pittsfield’s great baseball past — no city team had ever won back-to-back state titles. From there, it was an easy jump to Tommy Grieve, Gene Hermanski, Mark Belanger, Dale Long, Art Ditmar, and some of the other stellar names of the city’s big league past.

That opened door brought up the names of guys like Donnie Morehead, Ray Wojtkowski, “Touchdown Tony” Ferdyn, Joe “Zavy” Zavatarro, Larry Bossidy, and our personal favorite, Larry’s PHS and Colgate roomie, Chuck Garivaltis. We called Chuck the best pure hitter ever to come out of Berkshire County. Chuck signed with the New York (soon to become San Francisco) Giants in 1957, and spent two years in the Giants chain. That included a stint at Double-A Springfield. We told Chuck’s great story of being in the outfield at a Giants practice and seeing a young man named Felipe Alou rifle a frozen rope throw from deep outfield straight into the catcher’s mitt 250 feet on the fly. To hear Chuck tell this story must be what it was like to hear Arthur Conan Doyle by fireside spin a Sherlock Holmes tale. The Alou peg became Charlie’s first true glimpse of his own baseball mortality.

Do you know that Chuck — former councilor, mayoral candidate, school board member, and parks commissioner — still to this day is the only man ever to repeat as batting champ of the American Amateur Baseball Association tournament, held to this day in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. Chuck hit .483 in 1952 and .625 in 1953 against the best amateur ballplayers in the nation, the likes of which included Al Kaline, Brooks Robinson, and many other future MLB stars. Chuck entertained offers from the Indians, Red Sox, and Giants before settling on the Jints.

But here’s the kind of MAN he is. After his baseball career ended, Chuck drew on his education at Colgate University and took a sales position for Revlon. He worked in Minneapolis and Boston, on a career path that would likely have led him to the upper ranks of management, along the lines of Chuck’s Colgate roomie, Larry Bossidy. It was not to be. When his father died, Chuck left Revlon to head back to Pittsfield, where he took on the management of the family business, the Pickwick Hotel on West Street.

The disaster of “urban renewal” (more like “urban destruction”) wiped out all of Weest Street, and Chuck got into a successful career in real estate, where he is to this day.

THE PLANET is privileged to count Charlie Garivaltis as a dear friend, and our period breakfasts at the Red Lion Inn are marked “can’t miss” our our VEDDY private social calendar. We had another of those breakfasts last week. We talked once more with Chuck about his football career, his legendary stop of Syracuse’s Jimmy Brown with a one-man open-field tackle, about sandlot ball at the Crescent Creamery parking lot on Merriam Avenue, and so much more when we moved beyond sports.

Sports, after all, is nothing more than the great release from the pressures and damned seriousness of Life. It is play writ big. It should be and remain that way, free from politics, from political protest, from controversies over kneeling during the anthem. Sports should always be the place where you can relax after a day in the Real World, crack open a brew, sit back, and float into the ultimate meaningless of a final score. That said, sports is nothing less than a great metaphor for life itself. It is a struggle of us-v-them, a measure of accomplishment, a result of discipline and practice, a lesson in teamwork, a test of individuality.  It is a reflection of a philosophy of life to stay in the moment, to appreciate the gift our of our limited time on this good earth, to do and be your best, and shake hands with the other guys at game’s end, win or lose.

And so we again thank John Krol for helping us find and express these thoughts which had been percolating inside for a while. We thank all the good men and women who were so solid for us back in our youth. Most of all, we thank Chuck Garivaltis for being Chuck Garivaltis.

Our beloved Casey might have stuck out, but THE PLANET finds joy on the streets of our personal Mudville.

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“Hitting is timing; pitching is upsetting timing” — Warren Spahn.

“OPEN THE WINDOW, AUNT MILLIE.”

LOVE TO ALL.

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