Adam Bottner - My Almost Immaculate Bar Mitzvah Reception

 

 

So, in 1972, I am 10 years old. I just fall in love with football. I love playing it with my friends every weekend in the park, and I love watching the NFL on Sundays every week. I'm not very good at playing in the park, so I start focusing more on the watching of it on Sundays, and I just fall in love with everything about football. 

 

Now, my family had moved from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania a couple years before, so in the early 1970s, the Steelers became a great team. 1972 was really the first year that they had been great, like 40 years. So, that was the year I started liking football. So, I decided I was going to be a Pittsburgh Steelers fan. I fell in love with one particular player named Franco Harris. He was rookie of the year in 1972. He was a great running back from Penn State, and he was my guy. 

 

The Steelers were great that year. They went to the playoffs for the first time in 40 years, and I was so excited and I stayed home to watch the playoff game. They played the Oakland Raiders in the first round of the playoffs, and the Steelers were losing 7-6 as time was running out. They had about 20 seconds left in the game. Terry Bradshaw, the quarterback for the Steelers, fades back. Probably the last play of the game was fourth down. It wasn't going to happen. He throws it down field, ball gets batted down, game should be over. 

 

But out of nowhere, Franco Harris appears magically and grabs the ball just as it's about to hit the ground. He shouldn't have even been in the area supposedly. He picks it up. Nobody even tries to tackle, because nobody can figure out what just happened. He runs 50 yards for a touchdown, Steelers win. I'm out of my mind, I'm so excited. Franco Harris is my hero for life at this point. The Steelers are my favorite team. It's ridiculous how much I love the Steelers. 

 

The crazy thing was, we had a friend in Pittsburgh who became friends with Franco Harris somehow. He knew how much I loved the Steelers and Franco. So, he would send me stuff in the mail. I'd get an autographed picture. I'd get Franco's Italian army T-shirt, which Franco was part Italian, and the Italian community in Pittsburgh embraced him. So, I was just so in love with Frank Harris. 

 

It was ridiculous, obviously, but you're a 10-year-old kid, and these things happen, you just get so focused on these things. I grow up though, and he continues to be my hero. It's just ingrained in your brain. You can't help it. I loved Franco Harris so much that in 1975, I invited him to my bar mitzvah. [audience laughter] I loved him. He was so cool that he actually sent me a telegram and said, “I can't make it. I'm actually playing that Saturday night. [audience laughter] I'll knock a few yards for you.” It was unbelievable. Just more etched in my mind how much I love Franco Harris. [audience laughter]

 

And so, this friend of ours, this Max Gomberg from Pittsburgh, he actually took me to two Super Bowls in the 1970s. And that became my identity. I was the guy from Pittsburgh. I lived in Chicago, but I was the guy from Pittsburgh. I had the only Pittsburgh Steelers jacket in the neighborhood, and I just loved the Steelers. 

 

So, now, flash forward 40 years later, unfortunately, as happens to everybody, Max passes away. He had a great life. My family really didn't keep up with Max as much as I did. And so, I flew out to Pittsburgh to go to his funeral, because he was my hero. And so, I go to Pittsburgh. And in the back of my mind, I am hoping that Franco Harris might be at the funeral. [audience laughter]

 

I can't say that was my motivation, but I'm thinking that would be pretty cool if he was actually there. So, I go to the funeral home, I say hi to Max's family, and I'm looking around and there's no Franco. I'm like, “You know what? Grow up. You're 50-some-odd years old. [audience laughter] This isn't why you were supposed to be here. This wasn't supposed to happen, necessarily. Just be a man.” [audience laughter]

 

So, now I'm like, “Okay, I get it.” And so, I start walking out of the funeral home, and all of a sudden, Franco Harris, THE Franco Harris walks in. I was about to go to my car to go to the funeral procession to the cemetery, and THE Franco Harris walks in, and my jaw drops like a 10-year-old kid. I'm catapulted backwards in time, and I was like [makes surprised squirming noises] [laughter] I could contain it. And fortunately, fortunately, I didn't say anything, because it would have been really ridiculous. I would have been making an absolute fool of myself at a funeral, of all places. [audience laughter]

 

“Just don't do that.” So, it was amazing that I had this wave of common sense that came over me and allowed me to not do this really stupid thing that I was contemplating. And so, I go, and I get in my car and I'm about to start driving. All of a sudden, I look, and a silver Honda pilot right in front of me, Franco Harris is getting into his car. So, he's getting in the funeral procession. So, I get in my car and I try to get, like, I get wedged in between, so I can now be directly behind Franco Harris. Why it mattered that I was right behind Frank Harris’s, car in a funeral procession? I don't know why it was so important to me, but I was willing to bang into other cars and stuff, so I could be in the line right behind him. [audience laughter]

 

So, obviously, once you're in the funeral procession, you're locked into that position. Nobody is going to be in back of Franco Harris besides me. And so, I'm so excited calling my friends. I'm like, “His license plate is X175 Luna.” [audience laughter]

 

I'm so into the idea that I'm in the funeral procession behind Franco Harris. It's ridiculous. I'm 50 something years old, so stupid. But I can't help it, because it's like “I'm a 10-year-old again.” And so, we get to the cemetery. He parks. I park right behind. He walks right there to the grave site service, and I'm like, “Oh.” So, I stand right next to him. At this point, it's weird. It's just so ridiculous that I'm following this man around. [audience laughter]

 

So, I'm standing next to Franco Harris. Finally, I'm like, “Okay, grow up. Say something. You want to say something? Say it.” So, I look at him. I go, “Franco, I have to tell you.” I start telling him how I know him and I said, “Max was a very good friend of ours, and you have no idea how much you affected my life. You changed my life. That was my identity.” I said, “Max was my hero, but you were also my hero. You have no idea how much you affected my life. You were my hero.” And he goes, “Come here.” He hugs me with this big bear hug. He's a big man. He's got these big bear hands. He hugs me, and I'm like, “This is unbelievable.” I'm catapulted to when I was 10 years old.

 

I'm sure I had a dream. Not at the funeral, but I'm sure I had a dream about hanging out with Franco Harris. Over the past few years, I've been reading a book called The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. It teaches, “Be in the moment. Don't go in the past. Don't go in the future. Stay right here in the moment.” It's great. It has changed my life. But I will tell you something. Sometimes going backwards feels really, really good. [audience laughter]