Of Epochs, Callbacks, And The Art Of Growing Up

Do you know those times where you have a million different ideas converging in your head all at once? Because at the moment I can’t decide if this is one of those times or if I just can’t think of anything at all right now. I suppose it doesn’t really matter.

Sometimes, particularly when I’m driving, I feel like I’m simply being dragged through space by inertia. (I’m not talking about outer space.) It’s like I’m outside myself in a world where I make all the right choices, follow the rules, and everything that’s supposed to work out actually does. This is my happy place, which means it doesn’t exist in the real life. So eventually I snap back to reality — the open road designed to transport me from Point A to Point B, divided by the different lanes I could choose to take to get me there — alone with my thoughts.

Wise people say you never truly learn what you need to know until after you needed to apply it. I imagine it’s because people are too close and in-tune to themselves. There was a time I thought I really understood what the first sentence of this stanza was saying; now I really do. I really, really know I do. At the end of the day — even though that’s a cliche and I fucking hate overusing cliches — people are going to be who they are. There’s no reason to fight how they choose to act, because, you know, that’s so 11th grade; even if inside I feel the same playground emotions I did as a little tot, at a couple days until my 23rd birthday it’s time to just cut out the nonsense. I’ve seen too many failed high-limit blackjack hands to care about “feelings”.

There was an article I wrote over a month ago now; it was about my best friend and Grand Theft Auto; it (at least tangentially) relates to what I’m saying in the post I’m constructing now. It’s like … why is it so much easier to be objective and emotionless and factual when it comes to baseball … when I’m so blinded by the different forms of noise in reality? It’s as if I’m cyclically chasing an asymptote, simultaneously running away from the most obvious answers in front of my face. In Stranger Than Fiction, Dustin Hoffman and Will Ferrel are trying to decide if his life’s story is a comedy or a drama; it’s funny, because anyone could evaluate themselves in the same light. What isn’t taken into account is any other genre. Whether a comedy or drama, or some combination of the two, there’s also a certain aspect of fantasy involved in everyone’s mind, and at an indefinite age you are inevitably forced to cut that out of the picture. So that’s sad.

I guess I’m not really saying anything here. There are just thoughts and I just performed a way-too-long stream of conscious that probably doesn’t mean anything to anyone outside of the person who wrote it.

That’s why it’s essential that the Rangers exist, and exist as a constant. When you really think about your life, there are few constants. I mean, outside of family, and taxes. And dying. I do well with these constants, this never-changing structure. I can depend on the Rangers for 6 months out of the year and, now that they are so good, maybe even closer to 7.

It’s interesting that, even as Rangers’ fans — all committed to following the success of the team — we still can’t seem to agree on most things. It’s like there are a bunch of sub-fan-bases even within the fan base.

I think that was a big problem of mine in evaluating the team in 2012. I was so focused on good contract vs. bad contract, good-SABR player vs. poor-SABR player; I didn’t get to just sit back and enjoy the Rangers play baseball. Once things start getting serious (come April and May . . . ), I may revert back to that same line of thinking. But for now it’s less serious, focused on dumb shit like the Nolan Ryan situation; I’m just ready for baseball so I can focus on, well, baseball. 

This is a huge year for a Major League team that none of us really know how good they can be, a plethora of Minor League talents ranging from Joey Gallo and Lewis Brinson in Hickory, to Jorge Alfaro in Myrtle Beach, to perhaps Luis Sardinas filling the SS shoes of Jurickson Profar at Double-A Frisco, to Profar and Mike Olt and Martin Perez — once he comes back from injury — at Triple-A Round Rock.

We have a lot to be excited about.

Still, we’re in the preseason; we have time. That’s all it is. Time. We hate to waste it. We hate to invest 5 years into something and get nothing out of it. We hate waiting 6 months for the baseball season to come back to our lives. We hate waiting two days for another birthday to come and go.

And in no time, there will be a whole new set of things to wait for. Some you look forward to, others you stake your “feelings” on; some come true and some don’t.