Brooklyn Decker Vs. Mike Tyson
For ALL THE MONEY IN THE WORLD!
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It’s been a few weeks now, so I’ll tell you a little bit about what the Mike Tyson fight made me think about. I wanted to sit with it, and think about it, more deeply than quickly having a hot take that seems to be what other people tell me would DRIVE ENGAGEMENT and GROW NUMBERS! And speaking of numbers, I’m just a few away from hitting my year end goal. I’ve always been a believer in slow and steady winning any race anyone wants to throw me into. I think there are a couple of reasons for that. One, I was raised to get up early and get to it. I’m not afraid of hard work. My dad had some surgery recently and when I called and asked how he was doing, he told me, “I’m feeling better and like I will have productive day today.” And that’s how that works. The other reason for slow and steady is that for much of my life, when I started writing, I had another job that wouldn’t let me go for hours and hours on a piece of writing. I had to go to work so I could ‘go to work.’
I think that has cost me over the years, the idea of slow and steady. It’s paid dividends, too. But when I think of it, the costs come to mind first. I had a show I used to do in a theater, called “Peter and Jason Explain Everything.” it was me and my friend Jason onstage, sharing our lives, making fun of our own weekly failures and talking about things in the world. We did it either once a week or once a month. We’d have guests on from time to time. This was the mid 1990s, btw. If it sounds like we were doing a podcast, we were. It was just before there were podcasts. I always maintained that we would build an audience by being consistent and doing the show like we were doing. Slow and Steady. But I recall Jason being a bit worried that it wasn’t hitting a big number in a quicker way. So, we stopped doing the show. Later, I was doing one of the first podcasts I had ever heard of, with my friend Peter A. producing it, and another friend, who now really doesn’t like me, so I won’t say who that is because this isn’t about that. And I think that ended for some of the same reasons. We weren’t hitting a number soon enough. I tend to look at growth more than is there a big number. It’s why I say every week if you like this, tell one person. One of the things I love about Substack is I can do the slow and steady here. Committing to you that I’ll be here every Friday and seeing how long I can keep growing it. And no one is here to tell me that we must grow faster. Certainly not the intern department. Those guys do everything I say all the time without any questions and give the kind of feedback you want from underlings, “Another great idea, Boss! You did it again!”
So, enough time has passed since Tyson Vs. Paul Vs. Netflix Vs. The World that I’ve been able to sit with my thoughts on Mike Tyson, while I’m out for my daily hike, or I’m staring at the screen trying to figure out how to add more backstory to answer notes on a script but at the same time also please cut two pages. I think about that fight instead of just wishing it was baseball season already because at least thinking about Mike Tyson is more productive, comparatively. Also, if you are saying, “Is this worth Peter’s time?” remember I wrote 2000 words on “Bad Boys: Ride or Die.”
If you didn’t see the Tyson fight, the 58 year old ex-heavyweight champion of the world stepped into the ring wearing huge ass gloves, almost as big as the ones you’d wear when you go to a honky-tonk and see a fun boxing ring set up next to the mechanical bull. And Tyson fought Jake Paul, who is famous as hell for being famous as hell. He’s 29. The event itself was what you’d expect anything like what I just described to be. A disaster and an embarrassment for all involved. But I kept watching it and having this feeling inside me that I know I had felt before, but I couldn’t place it. Then it hit me like an uppercut from one of the younger, more experienced women boxers from the fight before Tyson vs. Paul. That means like a ton of bricks. Here’s where I felt that feeling before.
My oldest had been invited to a party of one of his classmates. This was a classmate who came from a family with money. How much money? When you dropped your kid off at the bottom of the driveway, there was a golf cart to take him the rest of the way into the estate where the party, the house and I assume the King’s Royal Hunting Grounds or the Queen’s Fish Hatchery or something rich people have I can’t even imagine, was located. There’s a moment when you drive up to the drop off in your 2003 Mercury Marauder undercover looking cop car and look at the staff where they see you and the car and yell at you with psychic powers so no one hears it, “This is all insane and you look like someone who realizes how insane it is, but please don’t say anything because if you do, I will collapse into a puddle of goo and give up my humanity because I was going to be a famous actor but I’m driving a golf cart on an estate now. Shhhh.” And I answer back, also with psychic powers that are also silent, “You got it.” And a few hours later my kid climbs out of the golf cart that ushered him back from the 9/10th scale Disneyland somewhere back in the estate, and he came bounding up to my car with an autographed head shot of… Brooklyn Decker! His friend’s dad owned a brand Brooklyn modelled for and so when he asked his 14 year old son what he wanted for his birthday, it was to have Brooklyn Decker come on over and take pictures and hang out with a bunch of 14 year olds. A rich person got to use a famous person who wasn’t as rich, as you know, a prop. See where this is going? Mike Tyson was Jake Paul’s fun little party trick. Like Brooklyn Decker was my son’s friend’s party trick. Come dance at my party, take pictures with my friends and pretend box with oven mitts for a little while. Here’s some footage after Netflix fixed the buffering problems on fight night.
If you bet I wouldn’t go for this same joke, twice, you lost there.
And what are some gifts you’ve gotten because of your idea of slow and steady being the way to go, Peter? You mean besides this amazing take that Mike Tyson is Jake Paul’s version of having real live pony rides at your birthday party? That’s already such a huge one, do I have to have more? Okay, fine.
I have the ability to listen more than I talk. I think sometimes my family thinks it’s the opposite, but I think of it as being quiet for a while and then a verbal hundred-yard sprint of a monologue.
Having an idea for a thing, then spending time thinking about the best way to get that thing out in the world? Is it a script? A book? A Substack? Comic book?
Exploring a few ways to attack a problem in my head and deciding on one way to go that makes more sense than the other ones. Here’s a great example to close with on this front. My dad can build and make so many things with his hands. And his speed in making these things is, “If I finish this quick, I can do five more projects before I don’t eat lunch. Because if I don’t eat lunch? Time for six projects.” I moved into a house and wanted to create a loft storage space in the rafters. I had some scrap plywood and had bought a sheet or two more from the lumber yard. He shows up for work and just grabs a scrap and hauls it up the ladder and starts nailing it down. “Hand me the next one!” From below, I counter, “How about we look at the pieces we have and strategize. I don’t want to end up having to go buy another sheet if I don’t have to.” He says, “We’ll talk about it later.” I counter, “That is stupid. Later is when you finish nailing random pieces and we’re driving back to have me buy more lumber.” The rest gets blurry, but I know I grabbed a pencil and paper and brandished at him crouched up in the rafters, trying to violently demonstrate how planning would work. Two things that don’t go great together. I didn’t take any time there of considering what the best delivery system of that idea would be. I might have also taken the ladder away from him, stranding him up there. Not sure. The police did not make an appearance, that much I know. We’re both proud of that. I do know he let me take the five minutes I wanted to sketch out a plan and we didn’t end up buying more plywood. And I know he felt he won, too. Because he realized the longer we argued, the fewer projects he was going to be able to complete in one day.
Slow and steady. It may not win the race, but it always reminds me that there’s a bigger race than the one I think I’m on right now. Maybe that’s the big prize. It is good to remember there’s a bigger picture than the one you think you’re in. If you realize that from time to time, you might breathe better, and things might go better. You can’t always do it, but in times of trouble, if you can think of it, try it.
“Build by word of mouth and you’ll always know you’re on the right track,” is a different way to say, “If you like these, tell one person. Word of mouth is the best way to grow things.”
And this is the advice I should also be giving myself. 2024 has been, according to one of my writer friends, “Gnarly as hell.” I hope if 2024 was gnarly, that 2025 will be bitchin’. But I would also accept, “meh,” as a victory.