A Hero's Welcome

In a day and age when simply crossing the finish line of your local 26.2 miler is deemed superlative and enough to earn you the title “hero,” much is left to be said about those who attempt what is truly and gargantuously remarkable. A hero is precisely someone who stands head and shoulders above the rest, giving your average Joe a standard that is at once awe-inspiring and though enticing, faintly reachable. As soon as we all become heroes, in the common sense of the word, superheroes emerge to mesmerize us further.

Enter in Boris Fernandez. Triathlete extraordinaire. Proven winner. First class kind of guy. Having achieved legendary status in our community is one thing, becoming the first Cuban to swim across the English Channel is audaciously supreme. And, oh yeah, he’d be raising money for a charitable cause en route to accomplishing said goal. Are you kidding! But the thing is, no one doubted for a second that Boris would be successful in his quest, not the man who is easily the fiercest competitor in these parts.

I recall bumping into Boris at Tropical Park Stadium as he paced the infield during a coaching session. Just the way he spoke of the task ahead made you believe he was up to something downright death-defying, the attainment of which would require the summoning of everything beastly in him. For instance, some workouts were so punishing , he said, that the only way he managed to complete them was by imagining Nazi soldiers holding his family at gunpoint. Not to mention the metamorphosis he was forcing his body to undergo so that he could gain around 30 lbs and increase his buoyancy in the water. Folks, alterations like those with regards to body composition require a change in diet and exercise habits, a process equivalent to throwing your homeostatic balance into controlled chaos!

In short, this was a figure whose mind was bent on a Hell-raising mission and motivated, in fact, by the sheer novelty of a unique challenge. But on that fateful morning of July 1, the frigid and choppy waters separating Boris from the French coastline became too much to bear. Nearing the halfway point and after having swam for over seven hours straight, he called it quits in the interest, no doubt, of self-preservation. Later on it was reported that Boris, via a cell phone conversation with dear friend Carlos Dolabella, reflected on the experience by saying: “I chose to stop, and now I must live with the pain of that decision.”

Now ponder those words for a moment. Does that sound like someone in the throes of defeat? Or does that sound like someone who courageously owns up to a bitter shortcoming? I would say the latter more aptly describes this man who now looms larger in defeat than he did in victory, a feat which only a select few are capable of producing. It has been said that the measure of a man is not determined by what befalls him, but in how he responds to adversity. Or to put it glibly, it’s not how hard you fall but how many times you will yourself back up. Boris was already a friend. He didn’t have to go TransAtlantic on us to gain respect or the admiration of those back home. But what he did will make us love him even more, now that he has shown the way, as all heroes who come and go are destined to do. To steal a few lines from the famous Spanish singer, Willy Chirino, I’d like to pay tribute to our comrade by dedicating the following verse to a returning hero:

“ Como Chirino, el campeon de la salsa, no te llamaremos ni Boris, ni el gorilla, ni atleta, ni el cubiche…diremos ESE ES EL MIO…”