I had a good day off. Ate breakfast after the blog, hung out with the babe, went to visit the new puppy we are adopting, who will hopefully be coming home Friday or Saturday, rolled a bunch of games of Strat-O-Matic Baseball while watching "The Bad News Bears," staring Walter Matthau. Then we got some Chili's takeout and watched "Death of a Salesman," a made-for-television movie staring Dustin Hoffman and John Malkovich. After that, walked the dog and went to bed. I made it through four pages of Scalzi's novel before I fell asleep, book in hand.
I didn't do any writing on the novel. I did do some additional writing, posting short recaps of the Strat-O baseball games to the fan forums where folks share their replays and projects. It's a different sort of writing, like fan-fic for sports nerds, and I enjoy it. As much as being a fiction writer has always been my dream, sports-writing would be #2. I would love to be able to cover a team and see all the games, write up the recaps, do some interviews, and just be immersed in it all.
I missed sports for a while. I used to be a fairly hardcore fan, turning on a game every night and spending my weekends either watching or playing something. When I got into my late twenties and had a little more disposable income, going out took over, and while I still kept track of my teams, I rarely sat and watched a game anymore. In my late thirties, my interest shifted again, this time towards gaming, both video and board, and that's where it's been until the past year and a half, when I've returned to this writing thing, in thought and mind if not fully in practice.
In a way, sports were something I latched onto as a coping mechanism for being bullied. They were a way to fit in. I was terrible at sports as a young boy, the worst player on my little league team, unable to catch a football, and I didn't even like riding my bike. When you add in being good in school and my mother dressing me in outfits that included such things as corduroy slacks and white socks in sandals on dress down day at school, while everyone else was in jeans and sneakers, you can imagine how much I got my ass kicked.
A couple of things happened. During the summer between 7th and 8th grade, I had a nine inch growth spurt and went from being one of the shortest kids in class to one of the tallest. That helped the bullying a little, but not much. I started working out and spending a lot of time playing basketball by myself at a park no one else went to. I mean, every day after school until it got dark, I was out there running, jumping, and shooting hoops.
That next summer, I returned to the summer camp I'd been going to for three years and discovered that I was one of the best athletes in the camp. When I got back from camp, I started hanging out with the neighborhood kids, and being a good athlete definitely helped tamp down the bullying. Unfortunately, these kids had grown up with me and knew how to get to me, so they still managed to pick on me, but I took it a little better, even gave some back.
But it really wasn't until my first girlfriend and one of my best friends got a car that I stopped being bullied, because I wasn't around the bullies anymore.
I had two good friends who weren't a part of the neighborhood group, despite going to the same school, because their parents kept them busy at home and out of trouble. I hung out with those guys as much as possible, but their parents only let them do things on weekends, and they both went away for the entire summer every year. When I look back, I realize that if I'd had a better home life, or if even one of them had stayed home for the summer, I would have subjected myself to a lot less bullying.
This isn't meant to be a pity-inspiring blog, by the way. It's just what's on my mind this morning. One of the effects of all that bullying is that I'm a compassionate person. Another is that I'm overly introspective, which can be both a blessing an a curse.
I suppose if there's a point here, it's that being a good athlete was the first identity I created for myself. It was the first time I'd done something I wanted to do to define who I was as a person. It was created out of a love for sports, and became a shield against some of the worst parts of my life. It was something I could focus on to shut everything else out.
We all need that, I guess. We find ways to cope with the things in our lives that are otherwise unreasonable. We choose things that help us, either consciously or unconsciously. Sometimes, like sports for me, those things are good and positive. Sometimes, like alcohol for my dad, they are terrible and self-destructive forces that come to rule our lives. Sometimes, it's hard to tell which one we've chosen.
And then there's the difficulty, summed up so perfectly by a Jim Croce lyric.
"But there never seems to be enough time / to do the things you want to do / once you find them."
I love you. See you tomorrow.
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