Month: November 2018

I found myself drenched in silence. The classroom, recently emptied, held the familiar hum of air processors and distant rumble of students. In that fresh silence I found a moment to think and now, to blog.

I think I have been a bit frazzled lately. I am under the normal pressures of life, so I am left with no excuse for feeling frazzled. I feel like I’ve lowered my standards of living tremendously as a way to merely get by. I live in the moments between the normal pressures of life, and I let a lot of the short term responsibility fall into the cracks. What I do, most of all, is glide between sheets of noise landing only on the quiet. 

What is the quiet. It can be as it seems–pure silence in which my mind can relax. It can be listening to a book or a meditation and playing minecraft. It can be watching TV that occupies the lizard portion of my brain and imagination but little else–leaving the rest to, well, rest. Most often it is being wrapped up in the arms of my partner and recognizing that this is the moment I feel loved, safe, and part of something. 

I used to find that quiet in the writing, but I don’t anymore. There is too much stress attached to writing as opposed to the relief and joy it always brought. That is the focus of my introspection lately. I need to know why I have no connection to the writing zeitgeist. 

For that I need quiet.

Mark the Giants down for a high draft pick. It is a mistake on their part to aim for such, but expect it to be how things go. All things considered, I bet they take a lineman and then shill for a QB in the second round. They are in this position because they dramatically departed from their first half offensive scheme and as a result had nearly 0 offensive production in their make or break second half of the game against the Philly Eagles. Needless to say the Eagles rallied and won and the Giants fell completely out of contention.

Most people act like they were always out of contention. I felt a few moments of hope before my eyes razored shut in despair. Now I know for sure that the Giants are the new Knicks. New York big three athletics is dead for the foreseeable future. What are the big three? Football, Basketball, and Baseball. Lost, Losing, and Lost a long time ago. Yet hope springs for a handful of other teams, including Chicago–a team predicated on defense and poised to whip the dog out of the Giants this week. Houston too no longer has a problem. Instead the old guard teams of the Patriots and Cowboys continue to stumble towards the playoffs and likely towards an early exit from the playoffs.

At least those fan bases still have hope. The best we can hope for in NY is a few good runs by Barkley on the way to a loss. 

Do you ever feel like you are running out of time? Feel like the window of opportunity is sliding closed and the weight of the thing is too much to lift again? That you’ve made too many mistakes and moved too far away from the path in order to have any lasting success? I like to call that Tuesday. 

And six other names. 

My fear of mortality is likely at the root of this desperation. That and a lingering sense of interpersonal certainty that leads to a lasting uncertainty. I continue to wonder when (at least not if) I get my vision of happiness or at least something something roughly adjacent.

In terms of writing it is more than a cold water metaphor. It is this concern that I continue to make wrong choices in terms of where to spend my writing energy and wind up spending what little energy I have (after wasting most of it through indecision) writing the stuff that doesn’t make me happy. 

Time is not exactly on my side here. Maybe I ought to be figuring out a way to get to work and get things right. Well, it isn’t like I’m not already doing that… Maybe I ought to be finding a way to do it right or at least better.

When I was a kid I was terrified of climbing into the pool. I wasn’t at all afraid of the water. The thought of drowning never crossed my imagination. No, it was the cold that held me at bay. That moment when your skin breaks the surface tension and that thin line of surface razors through your sensibilities and reminds you that this was a really bad idea but if you keep going you might get over it…eventually. 

That is the moment I have every single time I need to start writing a new piece. The surface tension of a story terrifies me. Yet, like the water it is a hollow fear. It is the idea of the thing–the brief yet lingering feeling of desperation vs. the cold vs. the thoughts of commitment and possibility of failure–that conjures doubt and resistance. I have not written new work in well over a month. I have not written work that I was already contracted to write in nearly a year. I stand at the edge of the pool terrified to dip in my toe. 

I don’t even know if fear or doubt are the right words for this situation. I do think the universe is not necessarily pushing me in one direction or another. I am faced with the choice to dive in or not and once in I ought to stay, because every time I get out this happens.

It is entirely possible that I am halfway or even 2/3rds of the way done with my time being alive. This is a tragedy but also a revelation. I may have burned through most of my life already. I may be in a kind of twilight and as such I need to accomplish as much as I can in the time I have left.

This urgency is born of simulation. I’ve been playing these games where entire lives are simulated. I noticed that in the games I tend to take the life paths I feel I should have, as if to resolve in my mind that I made a mistake as opposed to finding the bright in what is happening now. 

In truth all life is chance and opportunity. My life has been grand so far and I’ve done so much. Still I have much left to do.

Some Thoughts:

1. Watching the film of the flag game I am remiss to admit that I have lost more form than speed. In other words, my strides are awfully tight. I still have good fast twitch, but I’m not able to extend and stride. This is a problem my kids–especially the first born–have a tendency to fall into, which leads me to believe they are getting it from me.
2. I also realize that the kids enjoy and thus need to see me doing more of the things I love. More writing. More spending time with my partner. More physical stuff. In addition, actually playing games with them on their terms. By that I mean playing a little more CoD and Fortnite vs. hiding out in the magical land of Minecraft listening to audiobooks and digging holes. 
3. Crazily, the semester is almost over. This is a good thing, because I need a real reset. 

Don’t have a cohesive thread of a single thought today as I am exhausted from a long weekend with kids and the first actual physical exercise I’ve done in years. More on that in..

Some Thoughts:

1. Played in a city bowl game. I usually do one of these a year for the small (under 50k) city I live in. I haven’t played any sort of anything  in a while, so playing all of a sudden felt surprisingly good. The last time I did any physical activity was a high ropes course that I did not hydrate for or during and nearly died. I did not complete the course. I did complete the game with two touchdowns and a 2pt conversion to go with two drops in 6 targets. The points made the difference as we won the event 42-40. Felt good to move around. It felt draining as heck, but it felt like a good first step towards mind/body balance.
2. Wreck it Ralph was hilarious and really well done in terms of cute drops/easter eggs for grown ups. I don’t want to give too much away, but there is Stan Lee siting and some really great stuff with the Princesses. 
3. Sick. 
4. I hate being sick, but it feels like sick gives me a really good reset in terms of physicality. I’m going to rebuild myself in a lot of different ways. 
5. I’m also rededicating to the words. 

Misplaced my charger again, so this is likely the last time I use this computer until Sunday. Such is life. I could use the extended break from work. Maybe I’ll use a bit more of that time to work on the physical. I am committing to forcing a balance between mind, body, spirit, and heart. 25% shares sounds about right.

Or maybe all of these things ought to work in harmony and not be divided by the concept of balance or equal share. That very idea has gotten our species in trouble across the globe. The simple reason is that those who have worked to achieve their place in life feel that so-called equal share will empower those behind them to surpass them with less effort than it took the aggrieved struggler to make it as far as they have. The poor white farmers in the south didn’t get reparations, so the idea that blacks would suddenly have more than them–40 acres and a mule more–was absolutely divisive. In truth, we want the best for ourselves and want more than what others have in order to feel that we have achieved. This is the American way and, for the most part, the American dream. 

When you inject any conversation of equality into the mix, it instantly creates an unfair advantage in the minds of some, because of the fear of how such things will be applied. Take sports for example: If 5 people are running a Marathon and the last two were suddenly advanced to the rank of the 3rd place runner, the third place runner would be angry. Why? They have the most to lose in that equation. Even in a non-zero sum game this is true. Imagine seventeen workers in a business making 11 bucks an hour and 3 who’ve been there for long enough to see their effort pay off in a two dollar raise. Now the 3 are making 14. Except minimum wage gets raised to 14, so every bub walking in off the street will get the same rate that the 3’s hard work earned. The 3 should get an additional raise, but this is corporate America. We all know they’ll be told no, thanks.

I had a chance to reignite the tradition of seeing a movie on Thanksgiving with the family. By fortune I was not alone, though my kids were with my ex. I was with my partner and the other half of my family. Together we saw A Star is Born, and through it I was plunged into deep retrospection about my life, opportunity, love, loss, and belonging.

There is too much to tell in a brief ten minute window, but I want to preface this by saying that I played football and tag with the kids this morning. I was moronically slow and out of breath most of the time. I showed my age so completely that, long after we’d returned, I was still sweating. On Saturday I’m slated to play in a flag football tournament and there is a high chance that I will not be able to play an entire game. I can blame plantar fasciitis, but the problems run deeper than a bum left foot. Four bum ventricles compound the situation, offering me the stamina of an 80 year old man…. who smokes. I am neither 80 nor a smoker, but man it feels that way some times. 

This movie lingered on the idea of losing that what makes you who you are. My partner and I have discussed how physical activity is the yin to mental activity and how both are needed to have a robust creative drive. I’ve neglected one and the other has faded in turn. These are facts. These are correlations I am making as a result of the facts, but facts nonetheless.

I am losing my physical and my mental is suffering. I am in a position to correct both, but the truth is that I need to want it enough in order to summon that activation energy I used to rave about. I did myself the favor of eating better (gains likely erased by the machinery of holiday meals). Now I need to do myself the service of living better. 

Some Thoughts:

1. Gaga is a dang good singer who let it all hang out in this movie. She was unabashedly herself in the dialogue and movement. She was a reflection of everything I’ve seen from her manicured image and everything I’ve read about who she is really off stage.
2. Andrew ‘Dice’ Clay plays her father!
3. I am thankful that I am loved by a woman who knows my heart and wants to build a life with me.

I’m not going to talk about the Giants. 

Now that we’ve gotten past that, I do want to talk about what is being touted as the flagship game of the new NFL. This game, Rams v. Chiefs, resulted in 105 total points scored. It was an offensive explosion. Now this isn’t to say that there was not good defense. Donald pulled off two strip sacks. Rams scored multiple defensive touchdowns. There was defense. There was just a lot more and a lot better offense.

NFL Darling, Patrick Mahomes, hoisted 6 TD passes while the Rams’ low key QB (bet you can’t even remember his name) scored 4. 54-51 final score and the sports media was crazy about it. Me, kinda.

Here’s the thing: I love offensive football. As former WR and OC I want points on the board. I love the chess match between OC and DC as we each try to move our pieces towards (and away) from the end zone.  I just like a little more parity. 

So, will the saga continue this football week? Yes.

New Orleans will whip Atlanta badly. I predict 38+ points for NO alone. Likewise I think Cleveland finally puts the hurt on a team in yet another step forward for a Browns team that will be good soon. No more predictions for the week. I’m getting kind of superstitious and I’m not trying to vex anything that could impact my own team.

Some Thoughts:

1. It’s Jared Goff…

We love free speech. We love it unless it is hate speech. Unless it diverges from what we believe. Unless it scares us. Unless it challenges the stock market. We love free speech, so long as we have the right to determine what that is and ultimately who gets to say what and where. The exceptionalism of the U.S. social model argues that we are free and must preserve the right to freedom and embedded in that right is the fact that we are also the arbiters of freedom as the one true and free nation. This matters because we happen to build platforms for communication that are used all over the planet. Those platforms are ultimately governed by our ever-shifting ideas of freedom. As a result, we place expectations and exceptions on these platforms based on what we believe is right, true, and free.

I’m talking about social media here. 

More and more social media is being compromised by a number of voices. Some are trolls. Some are bots designed to push socio-political agendas. Some are sex traffickers looking to peddle product across borders and seas. In a truly free internet should all of these different types be allowed the same access to communication? Is the platform responsible for policing content, or is the platform to be seen as a street in which two or more virtual parties can meet?

Holding to the metaphor, the street can be patrolled by a cop who is responsible for such things. But who is that cop? Should Twitter be responsible for what people post? Should Facebook?

I struggle with the question every day, because I believe that people have a right to think and feel whatever they want. I believe in free speech. I don’t believe that people have the right to impose their views on me, but I do feel they have the right to share any and all views to those who will listen. In the same fashion I believe I have the right to challenge those views in a similar fashion. 

The policing question is difficult and in many ways necessary. I just don’t know how to deal with it.

Some Thoughts:

1. It is not lost on me that my favorite spot to write in the house is also the worst for internet and phone service.