It isn't a coincidence that Mike Ditka died two days before his Chicago Bears take the field against the Green Bay Packers. Somewhere in heaven, George Halas is probably handing him a headset and telling him to get his ass down to Lambeau.
My only Mike Ditka story is a quick one, but it is a good one.
The golf club my in-laws belonged to held an annual golf tournament followed by a big dance party in the parking lot. The evening always ended with a spectacular fireworks show. It was one of those end of summer traditions, filled with cocktails, old friends, and people pretending they had played better golf than they actually did.
Ditka was playing in the tournament the year Terri was pregnant with George. She was about three weeks away from bringing our first child into the world.
She was glowing with life. She wore a colorful summer dress that hugged her round belly, and she was absolutely beautiful. There is something magical about a woman carrying her first child, especially when you are the lucky prick responsible for half of the equation.
We had just arrived at the club and were walking down the hallway toward the bar to meet her parents. At the end of the hall, near the entrance to the pub, was the men's room.
Suddenly, the door swung open and out walked The Coach.
Mike Ditka, Iron Mike. The man who had delivered Chicago its greatest football season and a Super Bowl ass-kicking that Bears fans will still be talking about when the sun burns out.
…And he was walking straight toward us.
Without missing a beat, I stuck out my hand and said, "Hello, Coach. I'd like you to meet my wife, Terri Shepley."
I said it with the confidence of a man who had known Ditka for thirty years. Like we were old drinking buddies. Like he might ask me how my mother was doing or whether I was coming over for Thanksgiving.
Ditka didn't hesitate.
He placed those enormous hands of his right on Terri's pregnant belly.
Then he looked me up and down. Once… Twice…
"Just what the world needs," he growled, "another broken-down noseguard."
He gave me that famous Ditka stare. The kind that made me think he was about to grab my facemask, drag my sorry ass to the bench, and explain exactly why I sucked.
I just stood there grinning like an idiot.
Then something wonderful happened.
Those massive hands slid from Terri's belly to her shoulders. The scowl disappeared. He smiled at her with a gentleness you did not often see on the sidelines at Soldier Field.
"Good luck, dear. God bless your family."
…And just like that, Iron Mike became a sweetheart.
He stepped around Terri, gave me a little shoulder bump on the way past, just to remind me who was in charge, and hobbled toward the foyer. Within seconds, he disappeared into a crowd of people who looked at him the way Catholics look at the Pope.
Only in Chicago could a football coach walk out of a men's room and create a religious experience.
Terri was already the prettiest woman at Butterfield that evening. But now she had a smile that stretched from one ear to the other, and that glow of hers had somehow grown even brighter.
When we reached her parents, she told them what had happened with all the excitement of a little girl who had just met Santa Claus.
I stood there enjoying every second of it.
That is it. That is my Mike Ditka story.
It lasted maybe thirty seconds, but here I am, all these years later, remembering every moment of it.
Funny how life works. A man who gave an entire city one of its greatest sporting memories also gave a broken-down nose guard and his very pregnant wife a little moment they would carry with them for the rest of their lives.
Ditka probably forgot the encounter before he reached the parking lot, but I never did.
I suppose that is what happens when the people who shaped your younger years begin to leave this world. They take a little piece of your history with them. The games, the people, the celebrations, the summers when your children had not been born yet and everything wonderful was still waiting around the corner.
We didn't just lose a football coach this week. We lost another piece of our own lives.
Tomorrow, the Bears will take the field at Lambeau, and I have a feeling Da Coach will be there. Somewhere along that sideline, wearing his trademark sweater vest, jaw clenched, eyes burning, looking for somebody to chew out.
And if heaven has any sense of humor, he is still telling Halas how to run the damn football team.
Rest easy, Coach.
Thanks for the memory. Thanks for making the ShepKids mom smile.
And thanks for 46-10
