Today is the 4th of July. Which means two very important things in my house: the Nathan's Famous Hot Dog eating contest and the annual watching of Jaws.
Why Nathan's? In 2006, two important things happened to change the course of history.
1. Takeru Kobayashi won his sixth and final title at Nathan's in Coney Island.
2. My oldest son was born, but first he attended (in utero) the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest.
Some people can say they've seen Michelangelo's David in Florence. Others have run with the bulls in Pamploma, Spain. I've been to Coney Island for the Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest.
We'd moved to NY months earlier and I challenged myself to learn the subway system by picking random destinations and trying to reach them by train. Wall Street, then the West Village - and then I upped the ante by venturing out of Manhattan to Coney Island. It was mid-week, early spring and chilly. The rides were still, the boardwalk was empty, gray and peaceful. I walked around by myself and of course, I strolled over to Stillwell and had a Nathan's Famous. (With mustard and ketchup, don't come at me, anti-ketchup brigade).
Long before Nathan's, I'd considered myself a friend of the frank. I've enjoyed the Chicago-style with pickles and sport peppers (sport peppers just sound zippy, don't they?), Detroit Coneys with chili and mustard, and I've been known to have one (or two) foot-long Lucky Dogs, best consumed on a street in the French Quarter at 2 a.m. outside a karaoke bar.
But there's just something about a hot dog eaten in a 100-year-old restaurant on a blustery day in Brooklyn that sticks with you. So when I saw the contest advertised that 4th of July, it seemed like the most obvious choice for celebrating our nation's independence.
I did not anticipate two very key factors. One was that everyone else had the same idea and quiet Coney Island in March is not the same as hot, crowded Coney Island in July. Also, four months pregnant + the steamy pavement and sunshine and sweat of NYC summer = misery.
But I stuck it out long enough to see (sort of ) Takeru Kobayashi down his final dogs of glory.
That was my first and only time to see the contest in person, having moved back to Texas the following summer. But ever since ESPN started broadcasting it on TV, I've adopted it as my annual patriotic tradition.
Because I challenge you to find anything more quintessentially American than George Shea whipping a crowd into a frenzy over gluttony with such poetry as, "He is the citadel, and he shall endure forever, because he is freedom."
Give that man an honorary Tony, because the contest is American theater at its finest. If the Oscars are the pinnacle of cinema, then Stillwell Avenue in Brooklyn is the Hollywood of competitive eating and George Shea its ultimate master of ceremonies.
At my house, we relax in air conditioned comfort as we watch George Shea work the audience like a Vaudevillian on steroids in a boater hat. And then we make lunch...hot dogs, of course. Because 'Murica.
It might seem strange or even grotesque to cook the same meat you've just watched Joey Chestnut down 60+ of in ten minutes, dipped in water first to soften them, wincing as you watch the others gag, trying to force yet another down. Futile, you know, because Chesnut is seemingly unbeatable.
But I remember that anything is possible in these contests. After all, if a first time mother-to-be, full of hopes and dreams and heartburn, took the Q train on a sticky, summer day to watch a group of strangers shovel sausage and squishy bread down their throat, there are no limits.
How do you measure greatness? With a frank, a bun and a dream.
