Mark Breland's Hands

Have you ever shaken hands with a boxer? I know MMA is all the rage, and who knows if dimes and nickels are not being snuck into those tiny weight-lifting gloves. But the first time I saw Breland running down seventh or eighth avenues, depending on whether streets go up or down once you leave Prospect park; he was wearing a Trayvon Martin hoodie, doing some roadwork among his favorite fans.

I would not see him again until ten years later in Safety Harbor, Florida. It was actually Countryside Mall, which is more like Clearwater, or unincorporated Pinellas county. Anyway, big -time boxers were put up in the most expensive spa in town before big-ticket fights, for sort of their last meal.

I saw Breland again either before or after one of those spectacles and got to shake his hand. He was relaxed, dressed- down in a wife- beater carrying a shopping bag from which store I don't remember. And his grip; let's just say, you know how most sapiens have the universal, calloused palm-side, untanned since the dawn of creation? Well his was just like that on both sides, except dark.

It was like slipping your hand inside the finest pair of Bruno Magli gloves and a pair of Chinese finger cuffs, all at the same time. He would have made a great cornerback, or wide receiver.