Wooden Sharks and Lombardi Trophies

In 2001 my family and I traveled to Micronesia for a scuba diving vacation. To get from Hawaii to Micronesia you need to fly to Guam then take a short flight from Guam to your desired island. Pretty simple, except there are two vastly different ways to travel from Hawaii to Guam: a 7-hour direct flight to Guam International Airport or a 14-hour island hopping sojourn that stops at every borderline significant atoll large enough to warrant a 7-11 between Hawaii and the land of the brown tree snakes. (You can probably guess which flight we took.)

In our defense, we chose the island-hopper in large part because of my older brother's hyperbolic description of the Continental Airlines flying experience following his recent trip to New York:

Each seat has it's own TV with on demand movies and video games!!!

The lunch service makes Wolfgang Puck look like a hobo!!!

The flight attendants give out free pillows... and hand jobs!!!

The middle seats on the plane fold down, turning the cabin into a giant dance club with free champagne and a complimentary Puff Daddy performance!!!

None of us were huge Puff Daddy fans and free pillows are standard fare on airlines, but the allure of great food and non-stop on-demand movies and video games combined with the intrigue of stopping at various islands outweighed the additional seven hours of travel time and numerous take-offs and landings. Unfortunately, we were not aware that the island hopper used a smaller plane, which does not have individual TVs on each seat, and the constant take off and landings eliminate the need for substantive food service. Instead of a high-class non-stop dance party in the sky, we had 14 hours of Lifetime made for TV movies, cardboard flavored sandwiches befitting a vending machine, and small bags of Frito-Lays potato chips dating back to the mid-70s whose packages were mostly likely colored with lead-based paint. If the trip didn't kill us, the liver damage and kidney failure would. Awesome.

On the bright side, stopping at the individual islands provided an interesting glimpse into local culture and a great sense of the size and topography of the islands in the Western Pacific. I suppose that's like saying that the bright side to catching the flu is that you get to stay home and watch "The Price is Right" reruns in between bouts of vomiting and diarrhea; but after 14-hours on an airplane with only a few bits of cardboard, freeze dried turkey, potato chips and lead-based paint in your stomach, you start clinging to any ray of hope to delay cannibalism and outright anarchy.

After 12 hours of the Micronesian death march, when all hope seemed lost and we started openly debating the merits of eating my little brother, one stop made the entire trip worthwhile: Kosrae.

Kosrae is the final stop before Guam, a tiny, borderline insignificant island that wouldn't make anyone's list of Top 500 places to visit before you die. Tourists traveling to Micronesia go to Chuuk or Yap. No one visits Kosrae. There is nothing notable or interesting about the island except for one exceedingly cool local craft available for purchase in the airport: hand-carved wooden sharks. They range from one to three feet long, have exceptional detail, and real shark teeth, expertly affixed in the life-like jaw. They are the single coolest hand crafted item I have ever encountered in my travels and would look amazing sitting majestically atop my coffee table, boldly announcing to any that enter your home that you are a man who doesn't take any guff. You are an apex predator, a cold, icy killer with testicles anywhere from 25 to 200 percent larger than the average non-shark possessing male. Even better, the sharks weren't that expensive. They ranged in price from $20 for the smaller ones to $40 for the larger, more intricate carvings.

So, of course, we didn't buy one. We talked ourselves out of the purchase using contrived logic.

We don't want to carry it around in our luggage the entire trip

Only stupid tourists buy things in an airport

Clearly, they'll be available on the other islands

So, instead of plopping down $40 for a three foot long, gorgeous, hand-detailed Hammerhead shark, I kept my wallet in my pocket and got back on the plane. Worst. Decision. Ever. As we later learned, the wooden carvings are Kosrae's signature item and only available for purchase on the island.

I walked away from, hands-down, the most awesome, staggeringly bad-ass souvenir of my life because I didn't want to potentially regret spending an extra Hamilton. That is the reason why, ten years later, my coffee table lays bare instead of adorned by a fearsome virile totem to my masculinity. It is also why I am still so upset over the Chicago Bears losing the NFC Conference Championship game to the Packers this past Sunday.

Don't get me wrong. The Packers were a better, more talented football team and deserved to win the game. The Bears skirted through the season on luck, pluck, and verve, avoiding significant injury and seemingly catching every opponent at the best possible time. They played Detroit without their starting quarterback. Twice. They beat Green Bay by a field goal after the Packers committed 18,000 penalties. They beat a Dolphins team starting their third string quarterback, one so bad he was cut the previous year by Kansas City. They played Minnesota without Brett Favre. They clinched a first round bye after Green Bay lost to Detroit and Philadelphia lost to a Minnesota team led by Joe Webb (whose name I had to Google). In the first round of the playoffs, they got to play a 7-9, hide-the-women-and-children dumpster fire Seahawks team after Seattle miraculously upset the heavily favored Saints and Green Bay beat Philadelphia on the road. They caught every break all season long and their luck finally ran out at the worst possible time.

At the beginning of the season, I thought the Bears would be lucky to finish 7-9. They had no offensive line, no wide receivers, a secondary with more holes than a Michael Bay script, and a quarterback with a specialized ability to target perfectly thrown passes to the other team. After their miraculous 4-1 start, my Dad and I agreed that we would consider getting to the playoffs a wildly successful season. After they improbably clinched the division and an 11-5 record, we concurred that a single playoff victory would make the entire season worthwhile. We had no delusions of grandeur with this team. But, that's not how I feel today.

An NFL team only gets a few chances to win a Super Bowl. Just ask Peyton Manning, who's been to the playoffs eleven times and only has one Super Bowl to show for it. Or ask Tom Brady, who won three Super Bowls in first five seasons, but fell short the following six years. In fact, neither Manning's nor Brady's best team ('05 Colts, '07 Patriots) won the Lombardi Trophy.

Football is a bizarre game of chance and circumstance. A contest played by twenty-somethings with a ball that doesn't bounce straight. Crazy things happen and the best team doesn't always win. When you have a chance to win it all you need to capitalize and, despite their numerous flaws, the Bears had a fantastic opportunity to win the Super Bowl this year. They won in an unorthodox fashion - incredible special teams, opportunistic defense, and an offense that did just enough to keep Bears fans from vomiting in their mouths - but with a rock solid defense, a coaching staff that boasted four members with previous NFL head coaching experience, and only two games between them and immortality, the time was now.

Yes, Jay Cutler got injured. Yes, the defense gave up early momentum to the Packers. Yes, Todd Collins played so poorly as Cutler's replacement that they pulled him with 37 seconds remaining in the third quarter, even though it meant that if emergency back-up Caleb Hanie left the game the Bears would have to start Devin Hester at quarterback. Yes, the Bears probably didn't even deserve to be in the game in the first place. The fact remains, the Bears squandered a golden opportunity to win a Super Bowl and who knows when they'll have another chance to win it all. Dan Marino led the Dolphins to the Super Bowl his rookie year and, through the course of his Hall-of-Fame career, never made it back.

It doesn't matter whether you're the best team or the most deserving. It doesn't matter whether the breaks go your way. It doesn't matter whether you should be happy just to get as far you do. It doesn't matter whether some of your starting offensive linemen couldn't crack the starting line up for the local high school teams. It doesn't matter whether your back-up quarterback is appropriately named after an alcoholic beverage since he drives you to drink. At the end of the day, when you find yourself in the Kosrae Airport of football games, you better damn well buy the shark. Otherwise, a decade later, you could be left with an empty coffee table and an ocean of regret.

I'm pretty sure this Bears team will retool the offensive line, add some weapons to the receiving core, and return better than ever, primed for a Super Bowl run. But, I was pretty sure I could get a hand-carved wooden shark in Chuuk and my coffee table is still noticeably bare.