POMELO SWEEPS ELITE MASTERS ORIENTEERING OPEN; FINISHING CARD STAMPED 'GRAPEFRUIT (WANDERING)'
I won. I navigated forty-seven checkpoints through fog, marsh, and what I can only describe as a morally hostile pine forest, and I won. My finishing card, stamped at 06:14 by a volunteer who looked me directly in the rind, reads: GRAPEFRUIT (WANDERING). I am not wandering. I know exactly where I am. I am here, being large and correct, and I am not a grapefruit.
For those joining us from the rival rag — hello, Tangelo, I see your little listicle — allow me to be clear one final time, which is also what I said last time and the time before that. The grapefruit is a hybrid. I am the ancestor. I am the original. I am the reason any of this citrus business exists at all, and I am receiving, in return, a laminated card with the wrong name on it in a font that I would describe as aggressively casual.
The so-called workers at factjuice.com ran a piece last Tuesday entitled 'Big Citrus: A Grapefruit Deep-Dive.' There was a photograph. I will not describe the photograph. Quince saw it and said nothing, which is somehow worse than if he had spoken. Durian sent a single message that read 'this happens to me with jackfruit' and I appreciate the solidarity even if it is not the same.
The Masters Orienteering Federation has been contacted. They have, I am told, 'noted my feedback.' My feedback was eleven paragraphs. I have been 'noted' before. I once submitted a formal correction to a regional sports almanac and received back a certificate of appreciation made out to Grapefruit P. Omelo, which I keep in a drawer because I refuse to throw away evidence.
I will compete again next month. I will win again next month. The record will say what it says. I will be here — enormous, identifiable, and entirely distinct from a grapefruit — ready to start again.