To be perfectly honest, I was a shit soccer player.

I wasn't great at the other sports I played as a youngster either, but a part of me enjoyed soccer the most, if only for the belief it hid my relative lack of skill better than the others. Twenty two players on one field at the same time creates a hodgepodge of colors and noise roaming in all directions, and unlike the constant stop-lineup-and-start of football (or American football, for any international folks), soccer presents a fluid yet seemingly nonlinear picture to a random viewer. In other words, I could somewhat hide.

The one thing I could do very well in a generalized, unspecific sense was run around. I wasn't exceptionally fast, per se, but I could float around a field near or at my top speed for long periods of time without collapsing in a pool of my own vomit, which counts for something; that something being selected as a central midfielder which I played at almost every level of youth soccer I participated in, up through high school. I wasn't especially creative, and could barely use my left foot for anything other than short passes and as a source of constant self-loathing and critique, but goddamn it, I could run up and down the pitch and sure look like I knew what the fuck I was doing. 

Aside from being a shit soccer player, I also had the added value of finding ways to injure myself every other week. I gave up basketball during middle school because my left knee started to feel like jello. I had to put baseball down for a couple years after a shoulder injury on my glove hand made it virtually impossible to lift my left arm above chest level; a particularly cumbersome problem as a centerfielder which also made the whole "swing a baseball bat" thing kinda difficult. At least soccer put less strain on my knee once it began to heal and didn't require much use of my arms; but I was still brittle. After completing my freshman year on the JV soccer team, I felt as if I were using the body of a nearly deceased octogenarian. For the next few months, I moved about during school and elsewhere with the grace of a heavily tranquilized rhinoceros needing hip replacement surgery. Eventually the aches and pains subsided, and finding myself in surprisingly good spirits and awash with optimism, I thought I could make a run at the varsity team the following season. Two practices in during my sophomore year, while in the middle of running an otherwise mundane drill, I felt my left knee start to act up again. Didn't think anything of it since the pain was far from excruciating, yet mere moments later, in full sprint after the ball, I brushed paths with a teammate and our knees collided. You can see where this is going...it was my left knee that ended up buckling against his. The odd thing was, I don't remember the pain so much as vitriolic anger; not at the teammate for the collision, or at my ailing, utterly useless body parts. I was just...pissed. At everything. I hobbled towards the sidelines and I'm pretty sure I told our coach to "fuck off" when he gave a half-assed "you okay?" as I passed by. I do remember he didn't talk to me the rest of the day, which I could understand after having a 15 year old trying to make your team tell you to go screw, but I really didn't care. 

While the injury wasn't as serious as the cartilage tear I suffered a couple years before, it was a severe sprain that served a main course of required inactivity for a few weeks, which meant there was no way I could make varsity that year. More importantly, I found my desire to get back and playing waning by the day. I was done. I made a cursory attempt to play on the baseball team the following year, but mostly rode the bench as a few years removed the sport robbed me of my timing at the plate. In retrospect, I really didn't give a shit and have few memories from that team.

It was over.

While the benefits of playing youth sports are numerous, I share this because the hidden cruelty about my time playing competitive athletics is that the day I hung up my soccer cleats for good ended up being almost the exact point in time whatever innocence and youthful naivety I had was gone. Over the course of the next few months during that fateful sophomore year, a couple best friends of mine were killed and I lost my virginity; a bizarre one-two-three punch and kick combination that damn near changed me overnight. Neither of these things made me a "man", as becoming a man is decision one makes in regards to accepting and dealing with real responsibilities as opposed to simply "experiencing things"; yet, there's no doubt I was no longer the same person. The version of me that glided across a soccer field never once seriously thought about mortality or anything particularly serious outside of "where I should go to score a joint afterwards," nor did I have goddamn clue how to express or carry my own sexuality. For the first 15 years of my life, girls were pretty things with different anatomical parts that I didn't really understand well, nor did I have a strong desire at the time to learn more (outside of a couple early romantic interests, I was borderline asexual, really). Yet, in the aftermath of losing dear friends, something hormonal clicked where different gears starting turning; perhaps it was the materialization of some hasty carpe diem wave I rode during a time of significant emotional distress and upheaval, or it just took a few months before my 16th birthday to realize I had a penis. I really don't know; it was a fucked up time in my life.

Either way, it is funny, and sad at the same time, that giving up soccer so clearly represents a clear end to a certain part of my life. A certain part which was largely carefree, oblivious, and unrepentant. That "me" never wanted to take over the world or embodied any serious ambitions because I didn't know the world enough, nor cared to know it enough. I was just a kid. 

Recently, I had a random dream where I was back playing soccer on the JV team, yet I knew of the trauma and changes that would soon come. It took place during a game, and during the latter stages of it, our team draws a penalty kick and I'm asked to take it. The dream then momentarily becomes a montage of friends long gone and early sexual experiences, I assume this was supposed to be going through my head as I place the ball and approach the kick during "the game". Eventually, this dream then snaps back to me standing mere yards in front of the opposing goalie, and after standing there for what feels like eternity, my dream-self mutters "Carly" (one of my friends who would pass away during my sophomore year) out loud, before blasting the  ball into the lower right-hand corner of the net. There's no celebration with teammates however right after, nor is there anyone else on the pitch; the second I score, it's just me out there as everyone has magically disappeared. The dream more or less ends with me sauntering off the field, as I think even my dream-self knows this moment is complete bullshit. My alarm clock wakes me shortly after, and my non-dream, actual real self starts my day as normal. I choose not to really think about it much, because to conflate the pre- and post-soccer self into some feelgood nonsense seems almost like another tragedy on its own. Since that time and through today, I may dedicate things to those who have moved on, but not then. That version of me I want encapsulated and sheltered from the ills of the world and the now-realized faults of my current being. He was free, and I don't want anybody or anything to touch him. I don't want to burden him with loss, heartache, regret...anything. Let these things be the cross I bear today; I want to leave him be.

The Madness Continues

There have been more eloquent and erudite persons than I who have spoken and/or written at length about the polarization of our political and social climate, thanks in part to the rise of cable news networks, increased influence of interest groups, etc. I can attempt to rehash those points, but I won't, as I would only serve to boil them down to a tasteless mush of vague anger considering the steaming pile of fetid bullshit I've read over the past few minutes. Hey, at least I can admit the times when my mind isn't exactly as clear and astute as desired.

It's probably of no surprise that after the reelection of ZOMG PRESIDENT MULLAH BLACKENSTEIN FROM KENYA, the cantankerous, bed-wetting assholes of the far right became even more delirious. After all, Dick Morris and other retards at Fox News were all but promising a Romney landslide just mere days prior. LANDSLIDE! Yeah! Fuck that pussy Nate Silver using math and shit to come up with a "predictive model", whatever liberal and homosexual thing that must be, that ended up almost being 100% accurate. GOD! GUNS! AMERICA! Well, that dust settled a long time ago, and being the sensible people they are, they've clearly decided to reject the plain reality that they've lost not only the election, but more importantly the culture war, and just go off the derrrp end for once and all.

Recently, Family Research Council senior asshole, erm, excuse me, "fellow" Pat Fagan shit his pants over a very old Supreme Court ruling which overturned a Massachusetts law once banning the distribution of contraceptives to unmarried people. 

It’s not the contraception, everybody thinks it’s about contraception, but what this court case said was young people have the right to engage in sex outside of marriage. Society never gave young people that right, functioning societies don’t do that, they stop it, they punish it, they corral people, they shame people, they do whatever. The institution for the expression of sexuality is marriage and all societies always shepherded young people there, what the Supreme Court said was forget that shepherding, you can’t block that, that’s not to be done.

 I'll give you a few minutes to try and interpret that meandering block of goosefuckery, and if you can manage to read it more than once without having to fight a strong urge to start gnawing your own arm off, you're a better person than I. I'm used to seeing religious zealots of all kinds try, and ultimately fail, to explain their own morality as a necessity to be accepted by everyone, but to bring up a case about access to contraception from 1972 and argue against it so vehemently in the year 2013 only tells me this belligerent jackass must be just BRIMMING with other fantastic Puritan-esque views on sexuality. I'm sure he must be a blast to hang out with; perhaps we can get together and bitch about the heathen state of affairs in popular television, and maybe order some Shirley Temples at a bar and make impish conjectures about the OB/GYN bills of passing females. Deep down, it probably bothers him women are allowed to vote, drive, and all that "modern" stuff.

Of course, you must know in their impotent rage, maniacal conservatives would also attack gay people too, because, well, that's what they do. Dontchaknow, every time two consenting adults do something in the privacy of their own home, it affects EVERYBODY?? When my two gay neighbors have sex, the stock market crashes, my dog dies, and my car immediately bursts into flames. Sex between a man and a woman, however, when it's only for the purpose of procreation of course, saves cancerous kittens worldwide. Or something.

Some radio harpy Linda Harvey decided to throw her hat into the "let's shit on gays" ring with this deliciously batshit rant.

"I can’t tell you how many sad tales I’ve heard from people who’ve seen the destructive effects of homosexual behavior in the life of a son, a daughter, a brother or a sister. The first battleground of ideas is one’s own mind. We need to equip our kids to stand firm in their convictions and know how to defend them."

"Equip our kids" with what, exactly? Is there anti-gay weaponry out on the market I'm unaware of? Claymores that blow the homo out of you? An electromagnetic pulse gun that can stop any buttsex happening within a five mile radius? What in the fucking hell are you talking about? I understand as a radio host, you sort of have to fill the air time with words, but it helps when said words actually make sense. Seriously. Try that sometime.

And, actually using slavery to try and force a hamfisted analogy into whatever "let's protect the kids from them damn gays" revolt you're leading is utterly beyond comprehension. But, hey, maybe that's her thing; using historical struggles and heinous events to try and build gravitas around whatever hackneyed or utterly bogus conquest she goes on in daily life. "Much like how the roughly 1,000,000 who died at Treblinka deserved a better fate, I deserve a free macchiato refill at Starbucks!" "I can't believe Elizabeth Hasslebeck might be leaving The View! We can't let 8,000 more Bosnians be marched through the woods and endure another Srebrenica Massacre!!'

Good grief. Take a Xanax and fuck off, lady.

Foodie Orgasms

I like food. Good food. And, I especially love great food. I like to think I have a diverse palette, and a nearly unbounded willingness to try new things. I'll even admit to sometimes talking for a little too long about a new restaurant or particular cuisine I tried recently to some poor, nice-because-s/he-has-to-be coworker around the water cooler.

Yet, if I see another up close, soft focus picture of a plate of food on Instagram, I will stick my head into a gas oven.

I fully understand and accept that at its core, social media's raison d'être is to serve as a vehicle for everyone's innate narcissism and create circle jerks over how awesome someone is, and I'm just as guilty of this in my own ways, but shit is now getting just straight silly. My generation's reliance on the internet as a means to carve out a certain niche for themselves only results in literally NOTHING unique, or particularly idiosyncratic, as millions shout over one another creating an echo chamber of oblique, chaotic uniformity. Like, for instance, the hundreds pictures uploaded somewhere of pork dumplings in steamer baskets in the amount of time it took me to pick my nose just now. Wow, you like dim sum. What a fearless culinary trailblazer and precious snowflake you are.

All that said, the foodie craze, which has long been brewing for over a decade now, is not a bad thing. At all. The internet in general homogenizes certain fringes into the mainstream, thus opening the eyes of the masses to certain "alternatives" in anything from news coverage, music, medicine (not that the anti-vaccine crowd and hypocondriacs feverishly diagnosing themselves off of WebMD is an exemplary footnote to the wonders of humankind. We sure love to ignore professionals because "I read this thing once off a webpage..."), and of course food, just to name a few. I could easily write a more long-winded post on our food production in this country, but I'll eschew that in favor of simply saying this; it is unquestionably a GOOD thing we, as a general society, take more interest in what we put in our bodies, and how it gets to our plate in the first place. I can easily wax poetic on sustainable methods in agriculture and fishing, the importance of seasonality, organic foods, all that. These are all things absolutely worth the awareness and attention paid to them.

But, again, while I'm happy you may be making more of an effort to eat healthier and expand your diet, I don't really care to see it every fucking time you post an update to one of your feeds on the goddamn 'net. Really, it's charming that by Wednesday night you've already shown us your eighth meal of the week in pictoral form including a blurb of the ingredients, because, let's face it, absolutely no one on this earth honestly had any fucking goddamn idea that you can put bean sprouts in your pho. Fascinating! What next, are you going to tell me in excruciating detail that tomorrow night's ceviche has seafood in it? And it's marinated in a citrus juice such as, say, lemon? GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!!

Jesus. Do enjoy your food and try as much as you can. But, if you get the urge to whip out your phone the second the server puts the plate down on your table, please shove it firmly up your ass instead. The ensuing picture you upload on Instagram of your colon I will find light years more interesting.

Okay, shit, I'm still alive

Between the actual job I have to pay the bills, and the freelance work on the side I tell myself will become my new career aside from the fact it still nets me at most beer money on the weekends, what free time I do have I prefer to not to spend on a computer. That said, I'm not happy with this development. Writing has been a hobby of mine for as long as I can remember, acting in part as momentary therapeutic vacations from the inanity of daily life, and also on some basic level as creative exploration. I never intended to use my words as a means to change the world, alter perceptions, or for any other doe-eyed, naively earnest endeavor. If I can raise a valid point here and there in between sharing stories ranging from the mundane to the extraordinary, I've already won. 

I'm not even sure, but I believe this is a my fourth attempt at a blog. There have always been long gaps of inactivity before eventual dismissal with previous attempts at blogging, thanks to whatever shiny objects distract me for lengths of time; be it women, new hobbies, you name it. The entire point of this blog was to, in some half-assed way, chronicle a move to a new city that I would honestly try to make my home for the foreseeable future. I have tried to be more consistent with my output; not for what handful of readers I have but for my own being, since the act of writing requires a level of activity from, and engagement with your brain and emotions that most daily tasks simply don't. Yet, sometimes life hands you either a fantastic new opportunity or a plate of steaming dog shit, and your priorities change.

My commitment to anyone who happens to be paying attention is that I think, think, I have a current handle on what the fuck I'm doing in my life at the moment to the point I can allocate some more time to this. I've done this sort of thing enough to tell you that it's not so much a matter of inspiration, as it is will, to keep going. Per usual, I expect the content to be of the meandering, anecdotal variety as opposed to anything remotely akin to a diary, since I'd rather carve hieroglyphics into my testicles than disclose details of my employment or sex life on such a potentially open forum...but...you probably knew that already.