June 2013
3 posts
Prayer before bed
If I ever take for granted the moment when the media relations interns push away the sliding glass windows, opening up my view to a beautiful panorama of Turner Field (plus the very top of the Atlanta skyline) and letting all the humming, whirring ballpark sounds flow into the press box at once, go ahead and push me towards graduate school, and don’t be gentle about it.
May 2013
11 posts
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April 2013
15 posts
Death and Information
It’s a grisly coincidence that the Boston Marathon bombings and the Hillsborough Stadium disaster happened on the same day. I wrote a piece about what the two tragedies have in common.
Why The New Yorker Doubles Consonants
In this week’s issue, John McPhee writes about first drafts and the search for the perfect word (subscription required): http://nyr.kr/Z6WC7i, and Mary Norris explains the use of double consonants in The New Yorker: http://nyr.kr/182eHqj
Forgive me for nerding out hard, but this was almost an instantaneous reblog.
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http://www.esquire.com/blogs/culture/lust-during-wartime
Writing kicks ass.
PITBULL - OPEN LETTER TO JAY-Z CUBA VISIT
“Open Letter,” Pitbull (Internet, 2013)
Question of the night
Would they have messed with Mr. Carter if he was … white?Armando Pérez, y’all.
important Pitbull update
Damn it all if I don’t kind of almost like this - possibly his best joint since “Go Girl”. Plus, he rhymed something with Treasury, which I can feel is the next big thing in rap game one-upsmanship.
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Things I've learned in my second semester senior year courses
Contemporary Female Short Story Authors: Marriage is a constricting, numbing institution, to say nothing of procreation, and I should start apologizing to my future wife now to save time.
Sports Economics: If your favorite sports team has a new stadium and mediocre players, your owners are doing it exactly right. Celebrate your 85-77 baseball seasons with pride, you aspiring economist you.
William Faulkner: Mississippi is the muggy sanctuary of all evil.
Religion, Culture and Commerce: If everyone just left each other alone, the three topics that this course comprises would be super-easy to interpret from an academic perspective and beneficial for the entire species from a geopolitical perspective.
“We’re in talks with a handful of players who are considering it. There are up to four players being talked to right now and they’re trying to be organized so they can come out on the same day together.”
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4 gay NFL players could come out on the same day, says Brendon Ayanbadejo
And it would be awesome.
(via sbnation)
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March 2013
6 posts
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February 2013
16 posts
“It is because so much happens. Too much happens. That’s it. Man performs, engenders, so much more than he can or should have to bear. That’s how he finds that he can bear anything. That’s it. That’s what is so terrible. That he can bear anything, anything.”
—William Faulkner
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“People are understandably very fixated on New York’s arrogance and myopia. And these things are true. But also, growing up inside that world, I know how vulnerable and naïve and fearful of “elsewhere” you can be as a New Yorker. That it is a self-reinforcing sub-cultural identity of a certain sense. You know, that famous New Yorker cover image of Manhattan, where you see Tenth Avenue and Eleventh Avenue and Twelfth Avenue, and then the Hudson River, and then the vast plain with a few specks of light on it. One very familiar interpretation of that, and the dominant one, is that this shows the solipsism and narcissism of New York. But it also describes a helplessness and naïvete: “what IS out there?” It’s terror. New Yorkers can’t drive and they have to be proud of that, because there’s no other option but to act as though it’s a wonderful thing. But that’s helplessness and dysfunction.”
—- Jonathan Lethem, Interview (via sorryeveryone)
So on Friday I got to teach 60 little kids how to play hockey while volunteering with a learn-to-skate program run by the Nashville Predators, and it gave me all sorts of hockey emotions that I remember thinking I’d never get back again when I stopped playing in high school, and now I want to put them down somewhere so that I don’t forget them.
First of all, the kids come out from the rink doors and onto the ice like I imagine baby sea turtles would, some splaying out on all fours, others making it 30 feet on their first push of momentum only to come to a stop before they slowly, helplessly tip over, others causing 5-kid pileups with sticks splayed everywhere and everyone table-topping everyone else. Every one who falls has this look of serenity lying on their backs, because it’s so much easier to fall than to shuffle around living in fear of falling. (Metaphors.) That’s why they teach you how to fall so early. My entire skating career has been a paranoid, quasi-controlled fall. (Not a metaphor.)
I’ve also redoubled my resolve to coach my kids’ sports teams, unless they start to hate me, and then I’ll stand up in the far corner of the stands with a handheld video camera. The little ones stopping the drills at their most critical juncture to peel off and wave across the glass to their parents, who were earnestly following them around the rink, was too cute for me to take.
Walking through the parents dressing and undressing their kids, I heard little pieces of the conversations I’d had with my dad so many times over the span of 10 years: how good I did or where my bottle of Gatorade was or what piece of my hockey gear needed an upgrade. I remember when my parents promised to buy me a jersey if I learned how to put all my equipment on by myself as a little guy, but I can’t remember the day I finally figured it all out, but I can remember the days I spent learning one more combination of straps, getting that much closer, and strategizing about which jersey I’d pick.
Couldn’t stop smiling when I left the rink. I spent the entire program lost in the part of my life when hockey practice was the most important thing I did all day (unless there was baseball practice right after), and while I’ll never fully get that order of priorities back, I’m holding onto hope that I can figure out how I can get back to being that excited about little, fun things again. I’m going to need some more ice time to work it out, though.
