The Big Question

It's time to answer the big question, the one I have been avoiding all along. There is a fairly steady stream of questions I get whenever the topic of The Offseason comes up in conversation. People want to know why I would bother doing something like this. Those who know me well tend to ask how I am doing without my beloved sports teams to follow. They want to know if it's "hard" for me. I enjoy talking through all this with people, and it usually leads to a lively conversation, but there is one question that I tend to simply shrug off and not fully address. It's been asked of me in person as well as online online, and I have never really fully responded. It's the big one at the core of this whole project. The question is; Will I go back?

On my phone I have an app that lets me to keep countdowns to various dates. It's nice because there are always a couple of big events on the distant horizon that it's fun to think about as they slowly approach. I really love numbers and so it's fun to be able to tap an app and see that, for instance, I have only so many days left to go until I can upgrade my phone. As I write this post, I have 157 more days until I successfully complete a full year without following sports. Being much closer now to the end that I am to the beginning, my thoughts have naturally started to turn to how, if at all, I am going to reintroduce sports fandom to my somewhat new sports-free life.

In truth, if it weren't for the sports obsessed news media in Boston, I would be having a much easier time with all this. It's fair to wonder if the news would be so consumed with the local teams if they had not been so successful over the last decade and a half or so, but the fact remains, the local news outlets, boston.com in particular, are silly over sports. It's virtually impossible to check in to any Boston news resource without being updated on the current state of the Red Sox. But it doesn't end there. News about Patriots draft picks, Celtics trade possibilities and Bruins post season surgeries dominate even the most basic of news feeds. It's no wonder that the portion of Boston's population that never could have cared less about scores and standings feel frustration at how the local teams are shoved in their faces. I can see that now, and I don't like it.

At the same time, it's hard for me to imagine never going to see a game again. I don't think I'll ever lose interest in going to Fenway or Gillette, or the Garden to see a live sporting event. Then again, I have lost a lot of interest in and patience for live music. If I'm being perfectly honest, never giving TicketMaster another dime of my money would be a great feeling. Yet, I can't make a commitment like that. There are still bands I will want to go see, and there are still going to be games I'm interested in seeing for myself. But going to games was never really part of the "problem". I'm not a wealthy guy, so it's not as if I ever planned on getting season's seats to a team or anything close to that. In fact, I've never even been to a Bruins game in my life! Some dear friends of mine gave me a gift certificate to Ace Tickets for my 40th a few weeks ago, and I do plan on using that for a game this November. It'll be a nice way to return from this project.

The real issue was, and is, sports on TV. With Red Sox games on just about every day during the majority of the year, and three other teams (at least) playing seasons of their own, it's never long before a local team is on the air, defending our fair city's honor. I loved being (or at least feeling like I was) a part of that. I liked watching young players develop in to superstars, and I enjoyed watching different players and coaches interact. Seeing the little rivalries that develop and understanding the feuds and arguments that the players would get in to. Of course, in the ESPN era, there is simply *always* a game on. It's easy to flip to one of their many channels and just pick a team at random to root for. It's instant drama, and before long there will be a clear winner. No cliff hangers here. I'll miss watching a season develop. I'll miss watching careers go by. But the simple truth is, I just can't devote that much time to the games anymore.

What I will be happy to get back in my life is the occasional game, especially when watched with friends. Over the last few months, every once in a while an evening or a weekend afternoon have suddenly opened up with no plans. In those moments, I often think about how great it would be to unwind with a game droning away on the TV in the background. That is a feeling I will be very happy to be reunited with, especially as it will now likely be coupled with some guitar practice, or maybe some chess. Even better, the occasional trip to a friends house or a bar for a big game is something I dearly miss. I remember back when I was living in Chicago, I would always head down to a great BBQ joint called Brother Jimmy's for big ACC basketball games involving my Tar Heels. The crowd was big, and focused. It was like being at the game! I loved that energy, and I have often found something like it at various establishments here in Boston. I look forward to the next time, though I know it will be different not having put in the time all season long. Still, I think it will be fun.

So there's your answer. While I will return to following sports to some extent, it won't be anything like it was before. Maybe that's another piece of what this whole project was about. Finding my way out of the never ending parade of possessions, games, series, and seasons. After 13 years of wild success, to the tune of 10 championships, what more could I possibly hope for? Demanding more from these five teams could only be called greedy. It's time for new challenges that I can actually influence.

Parking Wars

In my crazier moments of fandom, I actually believed that I had the ability to influence the outcome of certain games at certain moments through sheer will. I felt that because I had a good handle on the layout of the good guy to bad guy ratio I was somehow empowered. Like some forgotten god among Zeus' crew, I would reach down from my imaginary Olympus to interfere with the course of sporting events, setting things according to what I felt was "right". I have been very lucky in that a lot of the time, my impression of what "should" happen turned out to be what did happen. Often this was simply a mental exercise, which would drive me very close to insane when things didn't go my way. But, there were physical manifestations as well. For example, in college there was a particular Tar Heels hat I wore, and for big games I would set it on top of the TV I was watching from. The hat, I thought, had some kind of mojo that would ensure a Carolina victory. Absurd, to be sure, but I did retire the hat back in 2000 with a record of something like 27-3. 

Of course, all of this is representative of a pretty mentally deranged thought process and an ego wildly out of control. It didn't take me long (or maybe it did, but at least I got there) to figure out that taking real ownership of things that were completely outside my realm of actual influence was not healthy. I suppose The Off Season is the ultimate extension of that realization, but it has occurred to me recently that there is something else in my life that I feel similarly about. Something else that, based on the evidence I have at hand, it seems I can control even though common sense would deem that patently ridiculous. What's more, I suspect I am not alone. I'm talking about finding a parking space in the greater Boston metro area.

Everyone has got a technique for finding a spot (or at least, they really ought to). Mine is a bit more of a policy, but it serves the same purpose. When setting out for a destination in our car, I know that I am going to drive straight to the front door of wherever we are going, be it a friend in the 'burbs, or a shop on Newbury St., and I won't take anything until I get there. This means that if there is a spot available at Clarendon, but the store we are visiting is beyond Fairfield, I'm not taking it. To do so, and to then stroll past an empty space closer to the goal would kill me. If I end up looping and parking further away, so be it. That's the price you pay for demanding greatness.

When rolling looking for parking spaces downtown, or in a mall parking lot or a garage of some kind, I feel like all of my basic hunter gatherer instincts bubble up to the surface. I am alive, sensing the wind, following my gut, ready to pounce. I can spot tail lights coming to life in a row of dead cars like an eagle soaring above the Serengeti. I pity those who wait for bag laden shoppers to emerge from the anchor stores and follow like jackals as they meander to their rides. That's no way to park. Not for someone with a pulse. No, you need to find your most fertile hunting grounds and keep moving, keep active. The areas near the food court, with higher turnover. A loop that provides meters on both sides for each leg of the circuit. You need to bang lefts as soon as others in front of you lean right, and look for empty rows that don't have pathetic squatters waiting for the slightest movement to hit their blinkers and claim the next vacancy. That's just ice fishing.

There is one area in particular where my powers are most potent. Locals may laugh, but I am willing to put this in writing. On my worst day, I can find a meter in Harvard Square with ease. Ease, I tell you! Not long ago my brother-in-law was in town, and we all decided to hit the Square. He is quite accomplished at things that people can actually do well at with dedication and practice, like cooking, skiing, and gardening. I wanted to show off my imaginary skills, and so I said out loud in the car as we drove down Mass Ave, "I think I'll get us one of the meters in front of Gorin Brothers Hats". I may as well have claimed I could make the Kessel run in single digit parsecs. 

I began to worry as we approached the traffic light in the middle of the square, already measuring the cars in front of me. Trying to determine, as always, who was likely to keep left, or go straight, and who else was looking to park. I saw more than a few cabs, so I knew I had a shot as we proceeded past Cardullo's, but the worry persisted. Had I driven too close to the sun? Written a check against my mojo that would clean me out for good? Perhaps, but there was no turning back now. The street was one way, after all. On I drove, to discover everyone else was headed for the river, or Central Square, and the road opened up in front of me. Once I was past the crosswalks, with the Brattle on my left, there it was in plain view. An empty meter directly in front of Gorin Bros Hats. On a Sunday. I was home, free.

That isn't the only time my parking mojo has worked, but it might be the best. And though it is just as insane as my belief that I can influence sporting contests, I'm not giving this one up for a year, or even a day. You guys can get out here. I'll park the car. 

Halftime

I'm sure I'm not alone in being generally freaked out by how much faster time seems to go by as we get older. I've often thought back on the idea that each year is a smaller percentage of a persons life than any of the previous ones that have passed. Your first year is 100% of your life, the second is 50%, the third, 33%, and on and on. Still, even if you can fully process that notion, it does nothing to prepare you for the actual feeling of time speeding up. The holidays start to run together. Birthdays sneak up on you, and the seasons themselves seem to wave sadly as they go by. This is all on my mind because somewhere in the last week, I passed the halfway point in this little experiment. I'm now closer to watching sports again than I am to having stopped.

Not that I'm dying for it anymore. Not by a long shot. Most days, I am perfectly content to go about my business without paying the local teams any mind. In fact, with more regular gym visits, more frequent and ambitious cooking at home, and more fun things to go see and do, I'm finding that even without sports in my life, there doesn't seem to be enough time to do and plan everything the world has to offer. But I feel better knowing my intake is a bit more balanced than before.

Of course, the are moments where I would love to settle in and enjoy the excitement and easy drama of a Sox game, or a Bruins-Canadians matchup, or even an NBA postseason game seven without a local team, so long as it ended in a buzzer beater. I have no doubt that I will return to these things after six more months speed past us. I'm encouraged to think that, when that time comes, sports will have to fight for my attention alongside so many other wonderful options.

Meanwhile, one of the biggest reasons I started this project was to get better acquainted with my own writing. For my whole life I have sat in awe and amazement of those who can write well. I have always imagined it a skill that was well beyond my purview. Writing was the thing that scared me the most about life. So much so, in fact, that several early attempts at simple journaling were aborted long before their time due to my inability to deal with how bad they were. I wouldn't allow myself to even try, for fear of failing. This was the cause of countless late papers, and, until email at least, the almost complete absence of correspondence with friends and family. Often, once handed the syllabus for a class in college, if I saw more than one or two manageable length papers would be required, I would drop the class in search of lower demands on my vocabulary. Even my handwriting has suffered for my mammoth self doubt. 

Many people far wiser than I will ever be have given me the same piece of advice at various points in my life. They've said, "Whatever scares you the most is worth looking in to". I found this idea to be true myself when, after a panicked involvement with a college improv troupe, I was encouraged to audition for a new improv theatre company that was starting in Boston's North End. I must have learned something from my old classmates, because I got in, and a great deal of what is good about my life has come from my involvement there. Though I had always felt some mistake had been made by my college buddies, I turned out ok, and had a great time in the offing. Why it never occurred to me to test the same formula out with writing until recently, I'll never know.

It took conquering another fear to put me in touch with my ability to at least allow myself to write regularly. That was the fear of returning to school. As I mentioned before, completing school assignments was never a comfort zone for me, but circumstances conspired to guide me back to the classroom, and in grad school, writing cannot be avoided. Even so, I may never have survived without my dearest of friends, technology. The iPad proved to be the best assistant I could ever have asked for. A complete word processor, dictionary, research library, and procrastination tool all wrapped up in a size and weight I could carry with me at all times. I did almost my entire degree, papers, presentations and creative work on my iPad, and I have written 90% or more of this blog on one as well.

Once I finished grad school, I felt the lack of output more than the relief of not having to do homework. It was a an absolute shock. Before long, I knew I had to start something to keep me writing regularly. I was scared that if I left that muscle alone it would atrophy and never return.  So here I find myself six months in to The Off Season. I've missed some good games, to be sure. However, I have traded those games for better health, more comfort with cooking, the ability to mix a good drink, a passing ability to imitate songs on a guitar, a steady, basic juggling hand, and a truce with writing that is starting to resemble a real friendship. To say nothing of a fun collection of plays, movies, museum visits, shows, and other events that may have been missed under, ahem, other circumstances.

Here's to six more months of new things.