You Can't Always Get What You Want

--"You Can't Always Get What You Want", The Rolling Stones

Most of the time I'm wary about getting hustled. I am very paranoid about people trying to fool me or persuade me to do something that I don't want to do. The way I see it, almost everyone has an angle. There's no sense in believing that everyone is completely honest with you about their agendas. All it does is get you in trouble when the time comes for people to take advantage of you.

In that regard I'm very wary about people begging for money from you on the street. Hell, I'm even wary about people trying to sell you stuff on the street for supposed school fundraisers. I've been involved with too many scams that involved preying on people's sense of charity and their willingness to support children's educational efforts. In most situations where somebody is begging for money I'll go to extremes to not give them any. Yet I never tell them no. As my friend Jeff makes fun of me for, I usually tell them, "that's alright." They ask, "can you spare any change?" I tell them, "that's alright," making it sound like I'm letting them off the hook. The only way it would send less ritualized is if I were to add, "That's alright. Don't worry about it."

The reason I give them this answer is most people are conditioned to argue against a no, especially in a situation where they are asking for something they want. What most people aren't prepared for is when a person is sounding magnanimous about their request. Again, as Jeff puts it, I always manage to sound like I'm doing them the favor by telling them now. It's like I'm telling them not to go through the trouble of asking me. Save your energy, please. Don't go to any effort just for little 'ole me, as Lucy might see.

However, there was one instance of someone asking money from me that stands out as being a complete example of turning the tables on them. I was just leaving my parents' house with my cousin when we needed to stop at the gas station. As soon as I started filling up the gas tank, a vagrant comes up to me and asks for money. He was right in the middle of his pitch when he noticed my Boston Red Sox sweatshirt. Suddenly he shifts tactics, asking if I'd been to Boston in an attempt to make conversation so he could butter me up. I know what he was thinking, he was thinking that by getting me talking and being friendly with me I'd be more inclined to give him some of my change. Instead, I launch into a five-to-ten minute diatribe about Boston and the fun I have there every time I go. While I'm waiting for the tank to fill up I'm describing the towns I usually stay in while I'm there, how great I think the T is, going to the Sox games, eating at the restaurants, &c.... By the end of the conversation I can tell it is I who have him in the palm of my hand. My suspicions are confirmed when the tank is finally full and I'm putting back the gas pump. That was his opportunity to ask me if there was any opportunity to ask me.

But I don't like him talk. Rather, I just thank him for listening to my "Silly stories about Boston" and suggest that he go visit there again soon. He tries to make a meager gesture with his hand to ask for money, but I just nod. I just tell him, "Oh, that's fine. You don't need to ask me. You've done enough just by listening to me." Again, rather than let him have the power by feeling I owe him a little something; I just turn it around by making it seem like I'm letting him off the hook of having to do me a favor.

That's the best way I've figured out to combat somebody pressuring you into situations that you're uncomfortable with. Treat it like they're putting themselves out and wave it off.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

And So It Must Be And So It Is Written, On The Doorway To Paradise, That Those Who Falter And Those Who Fall, Must Pay The Price

--"Stars", Les Miserables Original Soundtrack

Leave it to Glee to kick start my Les Miserables fanaticism once again. I admit, I was trudging along through my life with a scarcely a thought about that musical until the May 18th episode of Glee had to go and remind me just how much I love that play. There was a time where I was listening to one of its many soundtracks (Tenth Anniversary, Original Broadway, Original London, &c...) at least once or twice a week for many, many weeks in a row. But in recent years my devotion has waned as new interests have taken its place.

The thing about having a favorite piece of entertainment is that such devotion never really goes away. It sort of just simmers in the background until such time where the tiniest spark causes it to reignite into a full-blown conflagration. For me I just have to hear any number from the show and I usually start listening to all of them during the course of the next few weeks. It's just the way it is. It's just the way I am. Whenever I'm watching one thing, something inevitably gets me to thinking about another thing. Then that second thing becomes a priority in terms of having to go back to it. Another case in point, I was watching The Big Bang Theory the other day and they mentioned Firefly. Well, as soon as the episode was over I had to go right ahead and watch an episode of Firefly. As soon as I have the thought, I have to put that thought into action. Or, as Breanne likes to say, it's one of my many, many rules that I have to follow.

In that regard I am very much like Javert from Les Miserables. He's not my favorite character, but he's definitely the one people say I resemble the most. The way he doggedly pursues his aim without being distracted, the way he has this black-and-white sense of what is good and evil, the way he'd rather die than rethink his perspective--these are all reminiscent of some of my worst (and best) character traits.

One trait Lucy and I share is the fact is we're both stubborn. That fact has been mentioned many times here. The difference between our brand of stubbornness is that hers stems from a sense of being right all the time and mine usually stems from a sense that that's the way I've always thought about a subject or that's the way I've always accomplished doing a task. Even when I can concede that another way might be a better approach, I'll still stick to my guns just because "it's a rule." From the way I set the microwave to all sorts of eights, to the way I have to watch shows and movies "while they're fresh," even the "double or nothing" rule for straws--a lot of my quirks stem from the fact I started out doing a task one way and I doggedly must repeat the action the same way every time thereafter. But what makes it an idiosyncrasy is that after I decide this is the way certain things must be done, I'll invent a rule to give some sort of meaning to my decision.

Basically I work backwards. I'll decided what I want to do first and then I'll come up with a reason why it had to be done that way. Woe betide anyone who takes up the challenge of trying to get me to change my ways. That's where my stubbornness comes in.

And just like Javert it's lead me to some heartache and misery over the years. There has been many opportunities, many friendships lost over the fact that I must have all these facets in my life a certain way. If that way cannot be had or if something bars me from getting it done a certain way, I go on these kamikaze self-destructive streaks where I will absolutely plow through anything or anyone in my way to getting to my goal, even if that goal is all but rendered impossible. Or, as it's played more precisely out, I will go full steam ahead with my efforts towards a certain accomplishment and forgo anything and anyone who doesn't assist me in that endeavor. I'm very much the sort who labels people as those who are pushing me along or those who are just standing in my way.

And just like Javert it's usually after I've done what I set out to do that I realize that sometimes I've paid too high of a cost to get it done. That's when I usually come to the conclusion that what I wanted wasn't worth the sacrifices I made to have it. But by then it's usually too late. By then the only solace I can find is that I, indeed, got everything I wanted... even if it meant losing everything and everyone I really needed.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

I Wanna Know What Love Is, I Want You To Show Me, I Wanna Feel What Love Is, I Know You Can Show Me

--"I Want To Know What Love Is", Foreigner

I was in Irvine earlier today visiting Casey and Laurel. Laurel's been staying there for some undisclosed "problem." Well, I wouldn't call it undisclosed; it would just be undisclosed to me.

That's the deal with me and hospitals. I don't like going there. In fact, I avoided going there for two days, before going to see her. I mean--Casey told me the entire time that it was no big deal. She kept telling me it was nothing to worry about. However, I figured after her third consecutive day, paying a visit was the only right thing to do. I didn't want to know what she had, though. As long as everyone kept telling me that it wasn't anything huge, that Laurel wasn't dying or anything, it really does me no good to find out the particulars. It just makes me worried and unnecessarily scared. It's the same thing that happened when my grandmother and uncle were in the hospitals just before they died. People kept wanting to tell me what was wrong with them, but that's the last thing I wanted to know. Even knowing the problem, I can't help with it. There's no point in ever telling someone who isn't immediately involved with treatment what's wrong with a person. All it ever does is give a name to something that should be kept furthest from a person's mind.

I mean--I went and saw Laurel because she's become a regular person I see. But it just hurts me to see people who are that sick, sick enough to warrant a stay in the hospital. Barring a situation like Jennifer, where she literally had months to live, I would much rather congratulate a person after they're better and doing fine than come see them when they're not doing so hot. It's enough for me to know that they'll be getting out. I don't know--I guess I would have rather skipped seeing people's weaknesses, their frailty. It just reminds me of my body's weakness and my own body's frailty. Seeing Laurel like that, pinned up and poked with various tubes--it was like seeing Jennifer again just before she died.

It's a sight I don't ever want to see again. Not if I don't have to.

The one good thing to come out of it (besides the fact I was there to hear the good news she'll be getting out tomorrow) is something small that Casey told me while she and I were alone in the hospital cafeteria. She told me she had been there since Wednesday, the entire three days. She heard the same news from the doctors that I did, that it was nothing to worry about. She even got the suggestion to go home and that they would call her when they got better news. But Casey just stayed there, by the hospital bed when it was visiting hours and she was allowed to be there, and taking naps here and there in the hospital lobby and even in her car when she wasn't allowed in the room. She stayed because that's where Laurel was. She stayed because she didn't want to be apart from her.

People always talk about never leaving another person's side. It's a comforting thing to say. Yet when it comes right down to it, people make the choice to keep a comfortable distance. They tell themselves it doesn't matter if I'm here or not. It doesn't matter if I come home for dinner everyday. It doesn't matter if I spend every weekend with the person I'm with. People need their space, right? Casey has this crazy idea that it matters more when you do have that choice to be there for someone when you don't have to be. I tend to agree with that statement. Yes, I hate hospitals, but damn it all if I didn't try to do the same thing with DeAnn when she was in the hospital. Most people I could take or leave, but when I'm with someone I've done the whole sleep in my car, be there first thing in the morning, &c... That's just something you do when you love someone that much. Sure, Laurel was asleep a good deal of the time and probably didn't miss Casey all that much while she was out. But the important thing to know was Casey missed her the whole time.

That was the good part of going to the hospital today. It's been a long time since I've been around people who seem to have the relationship game all figured out. And I guess that's the redeeming part about hospitals. Being around so much pain, so much sadness, does tend to bring out the most human, the most loving side of people. That's the slice of life I like to bring back with me when I do step into a hospital--not the other stuff.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

And Then She'll Ask Me, Do I Look Alright? And I'll Say Yes, You Look Wonderful Tonight

--"Wonderful Tonight (live)", Eric Clapton

When I came out of the hotel bathroom on that April day in 1995 I wasn't expecting the sight that awaited me. I'm not exactly sure what I was expecting. I suppose you could say that I wasn't expecting anything except to sit down on the bed till we had to leave for dinner. Furthermore, to illustrate just how little I was expecting, I had gotten fully changed in the bathroom into a t-shirt and jeans before coming out.

Breanne definitively had not gotten changed during my time in the bathroom. I found her lying on the bed, covers off, still in her bra and panties despite the fact that she had had ample time to dress in the interim. I don't know—when she had come out of the bathroom in the white hotel towels I had just assumed she would get ready soon after. Neither of us had made that instruction implicit. It's not like I had told her, get ready because we'll go to dinner right after. Both of us were tired after three days of being out on the road walking and this was our first real opportunity to relax on an honest-to-gods bed so perhaps I should have known that she might want a breather that day. Yet I can only go by past behavior. In past behavior with anyone I had never found anyone just waiting for me in solely their delicates.

Nineteen years old and, yes, that was the first day I'd actually shared a hotel room with somebody of the opposite sex.


It was the first time for a lot of things on that trip besides the obvious. Aside from my family, it was the first time I'd spent four consecutive days exclusively with one person. Even on my last trip to Georgia I had had some kind of buffer with Breanne's parents. This trip, however, it was pretty much just me and her the entire.

As comfortable as I was around her it just never occurred to me that we could just walk around half-naked in front of each other. I was not aware we had reached that point in our relationship.

I still remember what she was wearing too. It was this white bra with orange floral prints on it. If there's one thing I remember it's those orange prints because during the walking she had mentioned how she tries to wear something orange everyday, even if it's only something small. I remember thinking, just like St. Patrick's Day, well, there's her something orange for the day. And below she had on a pair of modest black panties, nothing too revealing or sexy, but damn it all if she didn't look adorable like that. And it wasn't like she was posed or anything. Her chestnut brown hair still looked disheveled as it dried. Her oceanic blue-green eyes were vehemently locked in on the tv set and paid me no attention at all. She looked approximately the way I probably looked watching tv. If anything she looked comfortable at that moment in time, in that exact place. Going by posture alone it would've looked like she and I had been hanging out in hotel rooms like this for years.

“I feel like I'm overdressed for this party,” I announced, sitting down on the bed beside her.

Giving me a quick glance up and down, she replied, “Hush. You're fine, sugar. I'll be getting ready shortly.”

I turned towards the television myself. She was watching Pretty Woman on one of the basic cable channels. I didn't go for the obvious question of whether or not she had seen it already. That too we had gotten into a whole discussion of obvious questions being met with obvious answers. Or as she'd put it, that kind of question ranked right up there with asking if somebody was cold when they were plainly shivering or asking if somebody could walk when they were plumb knocked out on their lily-white ass on the ground. What I almost asked was if she thought I should shed some clothes just to make it less awkward.

But it was relatively obvious there was only one person present who found the situation awkward. Before I could ask the question, she piped up again.

“I apologize for my state. I just didn't know what I should be dressing for. First day in the city and you were mentioning you wanted to go some place nice. I wasn't sure how nice we wanted to go.”

“Nice enough. Is there a dress code in the restaurants around here?”

“Not that I know of, but I'm not sure how fancy we're talking about here.”

“It's up to you. We could go somewhere where what I'm wearing is fine...”

“Or what? Somewhere what I'm wearing is fine?” she laughed.

“Hey, there's nothing wrong with what you got going on there, Breanne. Nothing at all, “ I answered back.

For a long time I'd thought she was pretty. From the earliest days of her e-mailing me current pictures of herself or sending short videotapes of typical days in her life, I had known she was one of the prettiest girls I'd ever known. From her dimples, to her slim figure, to just the way she carried herself whenever she knew people were watching her, I found it easy to believe that she had been complimented on her physical beauty from day one. What it took me a long time to understand was that it wasn't a put-on. She didn't spend hours making herself pretty. She didn't cake on the make-up. Hell, she didn't even spend all that long looking at herself in the mirror. If there's one thing that spending three days waking up next to someone in a rather small tent it's whether or not somebody can make themselves presentable with limited resources. For the last three days not only had she managed to make herself look presentable, she had managed to keep herself looking pretty despite no showers and very wrinkled and often slightly dirty clothing.

It could have been have the fact I was at last looking at her from the right side of fifteen, as we had just celebrated that birthday a few days back, but I have a skulking suspicion it had more to do with the fact that she could appear magnificent under any circumstances that led me to the conclusion that my friend simply was beautiful.

I didn't know how to say it any better than that. Around that trip I stopped kidding around with the childish descriptors of “being cute” or “being pretty”. It was around then she really turned out to be something special to me, someone of real astonishing physical loveliness.

I watched her stand up unceremoniously and move to the other side of room. She was smiling, no doubt congratulating herself for thinking up something incredibly clever and wicked for me. When she reached the other side of the room she stood their plainly, hands on her hips, her hair spilling just below her shoulders.

“Ain't nothing wrong with this?” she asked.

“No. Nothing at all,” I answered her.

She then took her hands to the side of her head. She started ruffling them through her brunette mane, the whole time with her eyes still locked on me. I watched as she shifted her weight on her legs to her left side. She looked a bit more defiant, a bit more sarcastic in her stance.

“Or this, Eeyore?”

“Nope. Not at all.” I grabbed the remote from the nightstand to turn off the movie. I wanted to give her my full attention.

Next she spun around, allowing me to see the smooth shape of her back, the delicate lines the encapsulated her unique physique. My eyes traced their way up from her in-step, up her thighs, the contours of her butt cheeks, the small of her back, the nape of her neck, everything. It was like watching the unveiling of the Statue of Liberty. There simply was too much to take in on a single viewing, too many places your eyes wanted to wander. To do any real justice to the task, you had to be diligent. Diligent and thorough.

“What about this?”

“Can't find anything wrong with that either.”

I knew she was teasing me. She knew she had a power over me that defied all common sense. It'd taken me a long time to get over my apprehension in letting her know she had me in the palm of her hands when it came to how I felt. For a long time I tried to downplay just how much in love with her I was. Whether it was a question of her age or the fact she really was (and still is) my closest friend, I didn't want to commit to saying or revealing something that would cross over the invisible line I had drawn for myself. I didn't want to take the extra step of allowing all my feelings for her to be known. From the moment I let her know that I, indeed, reciprocated the feelings she had for me things between us had gotten a lot simpler and a lot more complicated at the same time. Before when I had thought she was merely playful, she had now turned into a different beast entirely. She had turned into someone who rather enjoyed torturing me mercilessly.

She turned around to again face me. She then walked the few steps till she was right beside the bed and me. Leaning over as to give me a full view of her cleavage as well as to place her face maybe six or seven inches from mine, she asked me again, “Nothing wrong with this?”

I wanted to pull her down onto the bed. I wanted to do a lot of things, actually. However, the larger part of me was curious to see where she was going with all this teasing. I mean—we'd had a lot of fun in the tent, but it certainly wasn't the same conditions we had here. The last few nights the only light we had was mostly moonlight and the far-off lights of whatever rest stop we happened to be at at that point. The last few nights the quarters were kind of cramped, which necessitated a proximity to one another that I would never quite complain about, but it also didn't lend itself to any sizable displays of showmanship. It was what it was, two people alone in tight quarters, conducive to a very specific type of evening.

That night at the hotel, well, the sky was the limit. I wasn't about to put an end to the night's festivities out of sheer tradition.

I watched as she stood up again, still next to the bed.

“I was thinking, sugar, that maybe we should order in tonight and save the 'good' dinner for tomorrow. I only have my one pristine evening dress and I reckon it would be best if that's the one I wore when we drove back tomorrow, you know?”

“You want to stay in tonight? But what happened to spending two good days in the city?”

She started to curl one of her brunette tresses.

“Hell's bells, all I have are the dingy clothes in the bag. I have nothing really suitable to going out on the town tonight except the one dress.”

“Whatever you wear will be fine, Breanne. Nobody will care.”

“That's not true. I'll care, please, thank you.”

“I'm sure you'll look fine.”

“No, I won't. I'll look beat. I'll look like the wrong end of the ugly stick, as my daddy says.”

I stood up next to her by the bed. I placed my hand warmly on her bare shoulder where I could feel some of her hairs barely tickle my hand. I didn't know what I was going to say. I only knew that it bothered me some that she could think that something as silly as clothes could detract from her natural beauty. To me that was like worrying about the trim of the house when the rest of the house absolutely sparkled. To me there was nothing she could wear that would ever lead me to believe that the ugly stick had come anywhere near her.

Sometimes I believe that Breanne intentionally discounts the way she looks for my sole benefit. She knows that I'll defend my assessment of her till the day I die. Even knowing that she might be fishing for compliments, I'm still inclined to this day to give her what she wants. It bothers me that much to hear her, to hear anyone, say she doesn't measure up. She has her flaws, but the way she presents herself, the way she handles herself isn't one of them.

“I know you've heard me say this a thousand times, Breannie, but I honestly think you're one of the loveliest creatures that has ever graced the Earth. I don't just think it's a question of whether or not you're beautiful, but of how much more beautiful you are in comparison to everyone else around you. I think you just blow everyone out of the water, it's that bad.”

I watched as she smiled. She then started cupping her breasts in her hands and squeezing them together.

“You just like these,” she announced matter-of-factly.

“I like those, and that,” I said pointing to her still unkempt mane, “and those,” indicating her lit-up blue-green eyes. “And I especially like those,” nodding towards the precious dimples that were making themselves known. “If I had to make a list of everything that I liked about the way you looked it might well go on for forty pages, Breannie. And you know how much I hate making lists. There would just be so much to list down. It would be so extensive that people might think I was shopping for body for my very own Frankenstein monster... or should I say my very own Breannestein monster.

“You're just too sexy for the world,” I laughed.

“And it isn't that you're only hot or sexy or whatever. It's that you're just gorgeous without even trying. I mean—I've woken up next to you for the last couple of days and I can't think of anything else I'd rather wake up to than this face. It might be cheesy to say, but I really could stay awake just to watch you smile while you're sleeping. Just like I could stand here now and just watch you stand here like this doing nothing, just being beautiful. You want to believe that the whole world is going to look down on you if you're not wearing the right thing or if you something looks a little out of place. It's just not true, though. Everyone can see just like I can see that you something that transcends whatever you have on or whatever mood you happen to be in. You have something indefinable, ephemeral. It's this inner grace that doesn't allow you to appear anything less than what you are. It's this inner fire that just raises everything else about you despite the changing tides of the day-to-day. You're tired for one day. You're cranky for one day. And you might feel less than your best for one day. But you're beautiful eternally. You're sublimely and completely awe-inspiring to me, Breannie. There isn't a day that I don't see you, that I don't think of you, and I'm completely lost in love for you. You make me that weak all the time. You should know that by now and, if not, I should tell you that everyday because it's true.”


it's late in the evening
she's wondering what clothes to wear

She paused as the smile gently worked itself from her face. Apparently, the cavalier attitude of the evening had been broached. Now we had progressed onto something substantially more serious in the evolution of our conversation. Breanne has never been one to let things slide lightly. She may be a lot of things and she may give off the impression that she only lightly considers her actions, but I know her better than that. I know her well enough to know that everything you say to her does sink in. Even at fifteen, she possessed enough mental acuity to let every word I had just sink in wholesale without questioning their veracity.

“You're just saying that because I'm indisposed at the moment. If you saw me at my grubbiest, you might well change your tune, Eeyore.”

“I doubt it.”

She faced me once again.

“I don't doubt that you very well could mean everything you said just as I don't doubt it's coming from a good place. What I doubt is if you really believe what you say or if you're attempting only to make me feel better. I don't need false compliments to make me feel better. I've never had. I know what I look like and it sure ain't perfect.”

“I never said you were perfect.”

“Close enough.”

“I'm sorry if I gave you the impression that I thought you were perfect. I'll try better not to give you that impression next time, my Breannie,” I laughed.

She let the meaning of what I said sink in before she continued with a slight smirk on her face.

“I don't care what you think of me because I know it's good. That much is obvious. I don't care if you think I'm the most wicked child on the planet or if I'm the saintliest of creatures. I don't care if you think I'm as ugly as a lopsided duck or as beautiful as a dish of ice cream on a Summer's day. All I care about, darling, is that you tell me plainly what you're thinking. I don't need the hyperbole. I don't need you to fan my already mile-high flames of vanity. I want to know what you're thinking without holding back AND without exaggeration. If I'm not looking my best, it's okay if you tell me. I won't hold it against you, you know?

“You're the one person I've always counted on to go and tell me thing straight. It wouldn't do for you to lie to me now even if only to make me feel better. If you want to go out tonight, that's fine. I'm sure it'll be a hoot-and-a-half. Just don't tell me I'm going to look gorgeous or beautiful or what have you because that won't be the truth. I'm a big girl now, I can take being seen looking better than some, but less than average. I can take one day off from being one of the prettiest girls in the room. What I can't take is you telling me what I want to hear because if I can't trust you, then who can I trust?”

I just shook my head. I took one good stock of the young woman before me—the fifteen-year-old young woman in her white bra with the orange floral print on them and the black panties, the young woman with the unruly hair and slightly saddened eyes, the young woman who I had had the privilege of calling my best friend for almost two years at the point—and I told her exactly what I felt.

“If you trust me, then trust when I say that you're beautiful. You're beautiful, you're beautiful, you're beautiful. I don't know how to say it any plainer than that. And trust me when I say I couldn't lie to you about that any more than I could lie to you about how much I love you. There are just some things that I'm just not that good at pretending. No matter how much it kills me, I just can't pretend to see you as anything less than my most beloved beautiful creature and I just can't pretend to love you any less than I do.”

“That would be the lie. That would be me not telling it to you straight, Breanne.”

She searched my face for a minute for any trace of sarcasm or guile. She tried to find the chink in the armor of my resolve. Finding nothing, she had no choice to believe that I was sincere when I said she would ever be my idea of beauty.

She took my hand and placed it on her heart. Not saying, she just left it there for fifteen seconds maybe while she locked her eyes on mine. I don't know what she was trying to tell me, but I had a good idea of what she wanted me to believe. Her eyes told the story that her mouth couldn't say. Even though she might not ever fully believe she's as sexy or as lovely as others have claimed her to be, from that moment on I knew she believed that I believed. From that moment on I knew she believed me when I told her she could trust me on that issue.

“Let me find something appropriate and I'll take you to dinner tonight, darling. How's that?” she said, finally letting go of my hand.

“It sounds like a plan.”

Finally, just before she went back into the bathroom to freshen up before getting changed, I told her something I should have told her right from the beginning of the conversation.

“Oh, Breanne, did I mention you look lovely tonight?”

“You might have mentioned it once or twice,” she slowly replied before shutting the door with a good laugh.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

And I Should've Known, With A Boy Like You, Your Middle Name Is Always, I'd Always Want You, Uh-Huh Yeah

--"Always", Rilo Kiley

Apparently, my dad's favorite basketball team is the Celtics. That came as quite the revelation on Mother's Day. I mean--you grow up with the man. You see him support the Lakers, even go to a few game with him and the rest of family. Then after, oh, about thirty years of believing his favorite team is the Lakers he drops the bombshell that his favorite team is their cross-country rivals, the Boston Celtics. Further, he states that's he's loved them as a team since he was growing up when all they used to show was Celtics games and not Lakers games.

Perhaps that's where I got my out-of-blue love for Boston, a city for the longest time I hadn't even visited yet still admired from afar. Perhaps it's genetic for me to be enamored with sports teams from there. It was always out of my hands; I had no choice in the matter.

What I find funny is that, here's my dad, living in Los Angeles and he's just like me, rooting for a team that he can't see their home games. He can't really belong to a huge following of fans that he can go watch the games with as one of a community. He can't really profess his love for the team for fear of reprisal from the diehard Lakers fans. And yet he maintains his decades-long enamoration of them because once you fall in love with a team--just like once you fall in love with a person--you can't ever fall back out of it. As Breanne says, you can't unbake the cake at that point. You're committed and that's all there is to it.

The only thing left at that point is stick with your guns and just love the dirty bastards with all your heart, come what may.

I'm proud to say that I'm glad I share this trait with my dad because the alternative, the fair weather fanaticism that is prevalent in Southern California just doesn't suit me at all. I never much loved jumping on and off the bandwagon and, apparently, neither does my dad.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

Cold On A Mission, So Fall Them Back, Let 'Em Know, That You're Too Much, And This Is A Beat, Uh, You Can't Touch

--"U Can't Touch This", MC Hammer

Baseball hasn't always been the only sport I watched live or kept up with religiously. Over the years I've experimented with being both a basketball and football fan as well. While those never took to any sizable degree, there was a long stretch back in the mid 90's to the early part of the new century where I kept up with the National Hockey League. Like baseball, I liked the fact that it didn't involve someone scoring and, unlike football, I liked the fact that they actually played more than a single game a week. If I wanted to my friends and I could go down to Anaheim to catch a Ducks game (I never cared much for the Kings at all).

I remember at the time my favorite team was the Vancouver Canucks and my favorite player was Pavel Bure, otherwise known as The Russian Rocket. He literally was the fastest man on skates I'd ever seen, which led to him being up there season after season in the goals scored category. And I remember thinking there's something pure about the way a hockey game is played. There weren't the thousand interruptions that plague a basketball game and, unlike even my beloved baseball, a hockey player really had to know how to go from offense to defense in the blink of an eye. Also, people may discount the fighting aspect of the sport, but there is something instinctual about protecting one's teammate that every sport carries with it in some way; hockey's just more upfront with this aspect than most sports are. Whether it's the eye-for-an-eye beanball tactics of pitchers in baseball or the benches clearing moments in almost every sport, rallying to arms for your team is a badge that hockey players happen to display more proudly than most athletes.

And I wasn't the only one who thought this. The other big hockey nut with whom I used to attend games with, Jennifer, used to tell me the fights were the best parts. Not because she enjoyed the fighting, per se, she used to say, but because they were so spontaneous and yet predictable at the same time. You didn't always know from the outset that a fight would break out, but if there was one to break out you definitely could tell which two would be doing the fighting. You could see the jawing, the checks that were applied just a little too diligently. After awhile, it became second nature to see the two individuals who would eventually come to blows. By then it wasn't a matter of if a fight would begin; it was only a matter of when.

We used to argue over and over of who the best fighter out there was. That became a matter of contention just as much who the best defenseman was or who the best scorer was. It was a matter of pride to declare your affiliation for a particular enforcer because it labeled you as a particular type of fan. Did you love the goons, the guys sent out to send a message preemptively? Or were you more in favor of the true enforcer, the guys who got sent out only after the other team had shown their intentions of hurting one's own star player? The reason why the players fought as often as they did was of tantamount importance as to how they came out in their fights in the end. It wasn't enough for a player to be known as the best fighter; the validation came as much as with their code of ethics as their prowess with the fist and elbow.

Everything you do has to mean something, Jennifer used to say while we were at those games.

----

It's telling that after Jennifer died hockey just lost all flavor for me. I mean--I haven't been to an honest-to-gods professional hockey game since 2002, and that was like four months before I found out Jennifer was even sick. Sure, the strike interrupted some of the fervor I once held for hockey. If there's one thing I can't stand it's when a sport denies its fans a full season, regardless if the blame falls on either management or players. But for the most part I stopped going because there really isn't anybody I can go with who shares the same passion for the sport that Jennifer and I once had. When I imagine my small circle of friends as it stands now, there's not a single one of them that I can think of who could elicit the same types of conversations and discussions that she and I once shared. It just doesn't mean enough to other people, I guess. That, in turn, makes it mean that much less to me.

If I want to go to a game with somebody I'll always have baseball. I've been to many games where the conversations were less than stellar, but where the game was enough to keep me entertained. When I think of going to a hockey game, I guess I expect something different in terms of an experience. Like Jennifer used to say, going to a hockey game has to mean something; I expect something much more than merely being entertained.

You could say she ruined hockey for me forever. Yet I see things differently. I hold hockey as something almost sacred now, it will forever be associated with perhaps the wisest person I've ever had the pleasure to know. And the fact that silly, little game was one of the common grounds we could enjoy together places hockey as one of the best pursuits that I no longer pursue. Simply because it doesn't mean as much to me these days doesn't mean I don't hold it in high regard still.

It will always mean something to me even if I never go to another game, just like she'll always mean something to me even though it's been quite awhile since I saw her last.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers

There She Goes, There She Goes Again, She Calls My Name, Pulls My Train, No One Else Could Heal My Pain

--"There She Goes (cover)", Sixpence None The Richer

I'm still a little under the weather so this is going to be a short post. I still wanted to share this before I forgot it.

I started feeling kind of sick on Wednesday, probably brought on from staying out a little too late the night before without adequate coverage from the cold one. I'm usually loathe to wear jackets, sweaters, or any other such nonsense. Sometimes it bites me in the ass like it did on Wednesday.

I wake up that morning feeling nauseous. I even proceed to vomit a little as I'm waking up, which is not the feeling you want first thing in the morning. In fact, I was feeling so bad that, instead of waking up properly, I went back to bed. My throat hurt and my chest was congested. Those were two things I did not want to deal with right away. I figured I'd wait for a couple of hours, then I'd assess my position then.

Unfortunately, Lucy did not have similar ideas as me. I heard the phone ring and a familiar voice on the other end of the line.

"Can't talk right now. I think I'm kind of sick."

"Awwww, are you okay, darling?"

"Not really. I threw up the first thing this morning. Now I'm just trying to give it a few hours to see if it goes away."

I should have known something was afoot when she didn't reply right away. I should have known that wicked mind of hers was crafting something sinister in the meantime. When she did get back to me, however, it was worth the wait. It definitely cheered me up for the rest of the day.

"It might be morning sickness. You could be pregnant...."

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers