Changing your strut when you know I’m behind you
Changing your ways ’cause you don’t know what to do
I only wanna tell you how I feel inside
If only you could listen, try to change your mind

I’ve got a friend, guy I’ve known for ten years or so. He’s got an enormous amount of staggering health issues, the little weak ones being severe diabetes and some muscle disorder that causes his eyes to constantly jitter horizontally, rendering him Officially Blind although he can drive a car and walk around and do many things that normally sighted folks can do. But that, combined with the vision challenges that come with being an albino, make him blind in the eyes of whatever agency makes those decisions.

He’s a really funny guy, very sharp and we get along great. Or at least we did, until circumstances caused him to move back to the smaller city that he came from to go back to work in the family business. A little more than a year ago he decided to come out as a gay man, came to all of his friends individually to tell us after he’d had a weight-lifting meeting with his parents that had gone well. It’s doubtful that the city he was returning to would be as supportive and provide the, shall we say, more fertile ground he’d enjoy in Austin regarding his sexuality, but he felt it necessary to go back. We all wished him well but expected that this couldn’t last.

So I walk right up to you and you walk all over me
And I ask you what you want and you tell me what you need
Can’t you feel it all come down?
Can’t you hear it all around?
At the place where lost is found, that great love sound

In his absence and his distance he took to Facebook to communicate with his friends from his remote outpost. He’d always trended toward the cryptic, but these one-line messages became exasperating in their vague but consistently sad drumbeat. The messages read like inside jokes that weren’t funny, but could only be deciphered by being at Ground Zero of their origin. A few drew responses, and those were either questions that went unanswered or feeble pleas from some of his less-stable friends who hoped things would get better.

These messages went on for months and mutated into tangential references to medical procedures or conditions that were never defined, just remarked on as episodes that resulted in depressing news, over and over and over. “Another doctor visit. Another disappointment.” It was impossible to tell what was going on, but the depressing message was clear – whatever it was that he wanted or needed wasn’t getting done for whatever reason. Lots of us wondered about his health and how badly he was declining, but there were no answers, just the beacon of pain flipping around in the fog.

A certain amount of this seemed to be a diva turn, some kind of need for him to be front and center for us all. He didn’t want to perform but he’d always wanted the applause and since he’d moved that want had turned to need. The volume of vaguebooking became something like a flood as it shifted to a cry for attention rather than a cry of pain. I can’t pinpoint exactly when that point was reached, but it was a common view of many – he was looking for an audience, people to care in a public way.

Lots of us have holes that can’t ever be filled. We’ve all got traumas and tragedies that happen along the way and how we react to them is the shape we take in our lives. Not every tree grows straight and tall; not every crack in the ground is filled and smoothed over. Everyone wants comfort and companionship, no matter how they decide to seek it out.

A couple of weeks ago he posted a picture of himself and another woman. She had her head poised slightly above his, and the two of them were in closeup. He’d let his hair go long again, long white hair down his neck and a little past his shoulders. It was difficult to tell from the angle, but the clothing that ended around the back of one arm looked a lot like a dress.

The picture was captioned, “Two Lovely Ladies.”

***

I don’t put a lot of stock in reincarnation. I’m pretty much of the mind that once you take the dirt nap, it’s all over except for the decay. This aging thing is all new to me. I don’t have a father to lean on for guidance, and my friends are generally younger than I am, so in some ways I’m the prow of the boat on this journey. That’s ok, I’m not complaining, it’s a role I’ve had for decades but every once in a while I kinda wish there was even the battered remnants of a manual somewhere.

When does the hunter stop hunting? Is it a matter of choosing different prey, or do you still go out with the braves but watch the kill instead of participating? Is that ever enough, when you’ve been the instrument that brought so many down in the past? There is a primal need for the hunt, just as there is for the kill but they become more difficult as time passes, and the reward incrementally less so.

I knew early on that she was in my blood. Our orbits would cross infrequently, but when they did we’d prolong the time in a strange mixture of celebration and denial. We’d spend hours together during the days, making little excuses to be in the company of each other just until it started to feel a little too real, and then we’d slide on to the rest of our lives. There was never a discussion of what was going on, and she could snap from comfortable flirt to distant acquaintance in the time it took for her guilt to spread its wings.

“We could be in Mexico in six hours. Maybe less.”

“No. Can’t leave the kids.”

Two days later we’d be in a meeting and she would never even make eye contact, much less acknowledge my presence in the room. The next day we’d spend hours together again, making small talk, trading stories, moving closer until she’d close her office door so we could be alone.

Age has brought doubt, and self-awareness has become a swampy jungle that can’t be reliably navigated. Abandoning the hunt feels like abandoning a room in a house, shutting a door for the last time. Or maybe the door is being shut for me, and if that’s the case then continuing on would only be sad and ultimately embarrassing.

Talking to you makes me wanna shake and shout
Touching you makes me wanna come right out
You could never want me the same way I want you
I’m love tornado struck, I don’t know what to do

So I walk right up to you and you walk all over me
And I ask you what you want and you tell me what you need
Can’t you feel it all come down?
Can’t you hear it all around?
At the place where lost is found, that great love sound

***

Seattle is a team that is trying to avoid free fall. Over a third of their roster has been turned over since beginning the season. A strong rotation has been ravaged at the back end, and prospects have flamed out while young players have been pushed to the majors. Sound familiar? It should. Ten games apart in the win column, but Seattle and Houston are closer than you might expect.

Seattle Mariners vs. Houston Astros

Friday, July 19, 7:10 PM CDT, Minute Maid Park
Joe Saunders, 8-8, 4.24 vs Bud Norris, 6-8, 3.63

Saturday, July 20, 6:10 PM CDT, Minute Maid Park
Hisashi Iwakuma, 8-4, 3.02 vs. Erik Bedard, 3-6, 4.61

Sunday, July 21, 1:10 PM CDT, Minute Maid Park
Felix Hernandez, 10-4, 2.53 vs. Jordan Lyles, 4-3, 4.02

Promotions
Friday, “Big and Bright Friday Nights,” Friday Night Fireworks, $1 Dog Night
Saturday, Faith and Family Night featuring Tenth Avenue North, Astros Blood Drive
Boy, those ought to pack ’em in.

You’re a rhyme without a reason
And you know it so well
Who’s the king of the season
Well you never can tell
Though it’s so plain to see
You think you like to be normal
You think you’re in control
But the action you take only makes you small
Just like the way it should be

The Astros are accelerating moves, trying players at different levels to see what they’ve got before the Trade Deadline, before making cuts, before next year’s Rule 5 scythe stops being Houston’s ally. Seattle is roughly a year or two ahead of the curve Houston is on now. There are some exceptions, namely Felix Hernandez, but that mix of guys who aren’t panning out and regarded prospects who aren’t quite ready has dumped the Mariners toward the bottom of the division, just this side of our Home Nine.

My friend wears dresses, jewelry and makeup now. He’s posted several pictures and our stunned silence caused him to ramp up his remarks about no one commenting. He looks like a man in a dress. Is that what he wants me to say?

I feel the twilight of the days of good hunting. I don’t know what replaces that, and what the penalty is for relinquishing the reins. I’m not all that great with time on my hands but whatever time there is will come at its own pace. I’ll deal with it as it happens.

I hope your futures are bright, and they burn on your terms.

You’re a book out of nowhere
Being read all the time
And the things that you give me
Only show that you’re blind
And when you know it’s all over
And you’re goin’ insane
I’m just there to remind you that I can’t feel no pain
Why don’t you let it be

Cause I’m not afraid to fall
No I’m not afraid to fall
I’m not afraid at all

Astros @ Rays Series Preview

contributed by Great Bagwell’s Beard

“Did you want to ask me something about Amy?”

I looked down at my plate of salad and said nothing for a moment. “Yeah.”

He arched his impossibly bushy eyebrows and leaned back in his chair.

“I..I want to court your daughter.”

He smiled warmly.

Within this space, there have been tales of good natured debauchery and heart-wrenching soul searching. The quality of the writing is jaw-dropping. And without fail, I read these authors and think “Shit, my life is boring.” I keep wracking my brain for stories in my past that even hold a candle to the fully embodied characters and images that the other authors have created. Which leads me back to an all you can eat salad restaurant on Highway 249, about ten years ago.

Next to my own father, the man who most shaped my teen years was my basketball coach. When team politics and my own negligible skills shut me out of the team for my sophomore and junior years, he was the one who wrapped an arm around my narrow shoulders as I choked back the tears I didn’t want my teammates to see. “I need an assistant coach for the junior high teams. You interested?” He didn’t need another assistant any more than I needed a horn in the middle of my forehead.

That’s just how he was. Always looking after every kid, from the star forward to the 12th man on the bench, just hoping for some garbage time minutes. I don’t know how many Sonic meals he bought for kids on road trips, but it was an awful lot.

He had calves like you turned spinach-fed Popeye upside down, until those cartoon forearms settled just above his ankles. He was tough on conditioning because even in his fifties, he could run us ragged. I don’t think I’ll ever be in that kind of shape ever again. I could run all day back then. And dunk. Really. There are photos, dammit.

And then there was his daughter.

Maybe it was one of those big fish-small pond kind of things, but all of the guys on the team were in love with her on some level. Like true high schoolers, some of us wanted to fuck her brains out, while others would be content to just hear her say our names. Long dark hair and an easy smile. Athletic legs like her daddy.

She was a few years younger than me, but I’d continue to see her around when I’d come home from college. She was growing into a real woman. She’d abandoned volleyball for choir. She got a lot of solos. And even more guys swooning. Still thinking of myself as a jock, I dismissed the these sensitive choir types as legitimate competition. I mean, seriously, dude: that fedora does not make you Bogart.

It’s here that things get…archaic. In spite of fifty years of backseat copulation, the rise of social media and the ability to send ill-advised dick pics in the time it takes to open a beer, there’s a pocket of society that wishes things could go back in time a bit as far as dating is concerned. Like, far enough back that “dating” isn’t even the word that’s used to describe it. They call it “courtship.”

It’s almost what you’re thinking. Sitting at a girl’s house, trying to have a natural conversation while her family lurks in the other room, checking periodically to make sure that you’re keeping an appropriate distance apart on the sagging couch. This is purported to be the antidote to teen pregnancy and hasty young marriages, but it also kills off any real knowledge of the other person. It proposes that a doe-eyed couple can best get to know each other within the context of their respective families, but all that context shows is what someone is like when they’re really, desperately hoping that their little brother isn’t going to wander in and tell about the time that you found a tick on your dick on that camping trip in third grade.

Somehow, I still thought this was worth it for a shot at Amy. It was the necessary price of admission. Those legs. That smile. You gotta take your shot.

The first step of the process is to contact the girl’s dad. Not the girl directly. Really. Obviously, this raises a whole host of potential pitfalls. She might not, you know, actually like you. She might, but he could cockblock you in a way that your frattiest frat bro could only dream of. He could set conditions that would make Jane Austen roll her eyes like “bitch, please.” It’s like the tradition of asking for a girl’s hand in marriage, but seriously premature, and with a much more powerful “no” in the father’s arsenal. And as an actual adult in his early twenties, I was willing to take this on. So I called my coach and asked to meet with him. He suggested the salad place by Willowbrook.

Only dieters, health freaks and old folks eat a Friday lunch at a salad bar. Nothing against a good salad, but unless you’ve got a pressing nutritional reason, it’s not anyone’s idea of a pleasant social lunch. I wondered if he was stacking the deck against me. Like this masculine tete-a-tete was supposed to take place over huge slabs of meat, so he was flipping the script on me to keep me off balance.

This was worse than actually asking the girl out myself. Faced with one of my lifelong mentors and and preparing to ask for permission to squire his daughter felt like loading up with birdshot and coming across a grizzly.

I shouldn’t have been worried about his response. Once I choked out my supplication between bites of iceberg and raw mushrooms, he smiled and gladly granted his blessing. He only asked that I not press things too quickly so that she could finish her degree.

Amy was headed to college in Dallas that fall, and I stayed in touch, emailing and leaving odd, stilted voicemails. She rarely called back. I sent her a card for her birthday in February, which she didn’t acknowledge until May. I thought I had some competition from another player from the basketball team, but he was thwarted as I was, even though I’d jumped through all the right hoops.

The worst thing about the whole “courtship” arrangement is that the girl is absolved of any responsibility for managing the situation. Everything runs through Daddy Dearest. When my phone rang in the fall, I wasn’t expecting to hear from my coach. “Amy wants you to call off the dogs” was the one phrase that I remember from that conversation. The rest of it was a blur with the overarching feel that this was a chickenshit way to call it off. Where was the chivalry and class in sending someone I deeply respected to be the hatchetman for her?

Soon enough, I heard that she had a boyfriend in college. Of course. A fucking choir guy. Of course. This soon became her fiancé. Of course. What I didn’t expect to hear was the crucial communication breakdown. Despite our conversation, her dad had never clued her in to the fact that he and I had ever spoken. She thought I was stalking her, not proceeding with her father’s blessing. Yeesh.

It’s all so mind-bogglingly stupid when you actually type it out. But it had its own internal logic, the overwhelming pressure of a small, single-minded community, and the volatile sloshing hormones to give it enough fuel to go to the moon and back without asking a single question.

There’s no moral here, really. Like so many things that happen in your early twenties, I outgrew courtship, shed that whole social circle, and became a lot happier. Also got a lot more action, though that shouldn’t be surprising. Anything above “nothing” is an improvement.

I found out this week that Amy just had her third kid with the choirboy. Good for her. I hope her daughters have the common decency to shatter a guy’s heart by texting him and then fucking one of his friends like a normal person.

Probable Pitchers

Friday, July 12th
6:10 CT, Crooked Tit Stadium

Jarred Cosart (0-0, 0.00) v. David Price (3-4, 4.18)
The much-awaited Cosart makes his debut tonight against a tough Rays team. High 90’s on the FB, good enough secondary pitches, and so far this year, a newly found maturity. Ace in waiting or just a closer in the making? Who the hell cares. Go get ‘em, kid.

Price has been hurt most of the year but has had success against the Stros in the past, giving up a .130/.174/.374 slash with just a single RBI (Carter) in 25 ABs.

Saturday, July 13th
3:10 CT, Fruit Picked By Poor Migrant Workers Field

Dallas Keuchel (4-5, 4.59) v. Roberto Hernandez (4-10, 4.93)
Well, this is a pretty even matchup. Keuchel’s been the placeholder SP type we expected, probably a 4-5 on any other team, but holding down the middle of the rotation this year. He’s faced the Rays a bit; Zobrist and Sean Rodriguez have both tagged him for doubles. Overall, they’ve got a .903 OPS against him. Ugh.

Hernandez is only 32, but it seems like he’s been in the league forever. Remember when he won 19 (!) games for the Indians. Really. Look it up. Carter is hitting .333 with a homer and no K’s against him, but the team is a collective .167/.278/.522. Guess we need Carter to hit one into the fish tank.

Sunday, July 14th
12:40 CT, I Said No Pulp Asshole Field

Erik Bedard (3-5, 4.67) v. Chris “Sterling” Archer (3-3, 3.59)
That Bedard has been mostly healthy this year is one of my biggest surprises. His inconsistency isn’t. Perhaps that’s cynical of me. Oh well. Only Des Jennings, Luke Scott and James Loney hit him well.

Archer (code name: Duchess) has put up a relatively good year so far. He started the Independence Day game against the Astros, and was sent home with a no-decision. Some way to celebrate the defeat of those aliens by the Fresh Prince. Wallace hit a homer off of him, so there’s that.

Injuries

Astros

Trevor Crowe: Right shoulder sprain. Rehabbing in EST.
Edgar Gonzalez: Right shoulder sprain. Hmm. Suspicious rash of these going around.
Justin Maxwell: Concussion. Thank God Roger Goodell is finally doing something about this.
Alex White: DOA.

Rays

Alex Cobb: Concussion. As a pitcher? Really?
Brandon Gomes: Right lat strain. Do you even lift, bro?
Jeff Niemann (WOOOO RICE!): Out for season (BOOOO RICE!)
Juan Oviedo: TJ Surgery. Unlikely that they’ll start calling in Juan Oviedo Surgery, buddy.

Promotions!

Oh do we have some doozies this time. As if “air conditioning” wasn’t promotion enough.

Saturday: KC & The Motherfucking Sunshine Band in concert!!! And it’s free with your game ticket! It’s two disappointing things for the price of one!

Sunday: DJ Kitty Confetti Globe. This is not actually a series of randomly assembled words, but an actual description of what you’ll receive if you’re not 14 yet.

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE
Carly Rae Jepsen post-game concert!!! I really hope she plays Call Me Maybe.

Talk About It In The GAME ZONE!